JOHANNESBURG, Aug 31: Negotiators at the Earth Summit haggling over an action plan for tackling the world’s worst problems cleared a key hurdle on Saturday, leaving around a dozen left before world leaders gather here on Monday.

The deal, centring on references to the Kyoto Protocol on global warming, appeared to be a concession by the United States and green campaigners suspected that a secret trade-off lurked behind it as delegates horse-traded into the night.

The deal on Kyoto was one of 14 sticking points that have pitched the United States against the European Union, and the rich world against the poor, in efforts to craft a “Plan of Implementation” for rooting out poverty and protecting the Earth’s deteriorating environment.

Under the compromise, the draft says that states which have already ratified the pact “strongly urge states that have not already done so to ratify the Kyoto Protocol in a timely manner.”

Bush ditched Kyoto in March last year in one of his first acts in office, declaring that its obligations to trim greenhouse gas pollution were unfair and too costly for the American economy.

The protocol requires industrialized countries to trim output of carbon-based gases by a deadline of 2008-2012.

It can take effect only once it has been ratified by at least 55 countries accounting for at least 55 percent of carbon dioxide emissions at 1990 levels.

Ratification by Russia, the last major industrial signatory, is vital, because this will push the numbers beyond 55 percent.

The Russian government reaffirmed Saturday that it would ratify the protocol.

Friends of the Earth campaigner Kate Hampton said the text agreed Saturday “marks the continued isolation of the United States and Australia,” which has followed the United States in refusing to ratify Kyoto.

“However, it’s nothing new, and I’m afraid it may be a tradeoff for something else.”

Other big problems in the draft text are setting specific timetables for providing sanitation and electricity for the world’s poor, and for reversing the planet’s dizzying loss of biodiversity.

The United States has fiercely opposed “targeted commitments” on all of these, although it shares the EU’s opposition to making concessions on scrapping farming subsidies.

According to the World Bank, the rich world spends nearly a billion dollars a day in agriculture support, a largesse that destroys rural livelihoods in poor countries around the world.

The 71-page Plan of Implementation is not binding.

But it could have a resounding political impact, because it will determine the environmental agenda for the next 10 years, and its text is likely to be the model for any legally-binding treaties that emerge.

Heads of state and government, or their ministerial stand-ins, will gather from Monday for a three-day meeting to climax the summit.

In addition to approving the draft action plan, they are scheduled to issue a declaration reaffirming their political commitment to sustainable development.

Those attending will include Chinese Prime Minister Zhu Rongji, French President Jacques Chirac, President Megawati Sukarnoputri of Indonesia, German Chancellor Gerhard Schroeder, British Prime Minister Tony Blair, Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Kasyanov and Prime Minister John Howard of Australia.

Bush has declined to attend. He will be represented by Secretary of State Colin Powell.—AFP