Climate Red - News and Views on Climate Change Issues.

THE European Union and environmentalists called for urgent action on climate change at UN-led talks in Germany today, but the US said it was too early for substantial steps on a global warming pact.

A further sign of US unwillingness to move swiftly came in a draft climate statement by the group of eight leading rich nations - for release at a G8 meet next month - suggesting Washington was not ready to propose emissions targets.

Both today's meeting in Bonn and the coming G8 talks are meant to feed into UN discussions to get a global climate deal by the end of next year in Copenhagen, to come into force after the first round of the Kyoto Protocol expires in 2012.

The present Kyoto pact caps the planet-warming greenhouse gases of about 37 industrialised countries, but not those of the world's top two emitters - the US and China.

"There's a huge urgency here," Artur Runge-Metzger, the EU's head of climate negotiation, said.

"Rather little has happened in the past six months."

By contrast, US climate negotiator Harlan Watson, speaking to senior officials from more than 160 countries gathered in Bonn, counselled patience.

"We do not see negotiating substantive outcomes to conclusion at this stage, as the Bali Action Plan is a two-year plan of work," said Mr Watson, referring to the launch of climate talks last December in Bali, Indonesia.