The financial crisis cannot slow negotiations on a future accord to fight climate change or derail the process, United Nations climate chief Yvo de Boer said here Tuesday. "We can't afford to let the process slip," de Boer told AFP on the sidelines of an environment ministers' meeting in Warsaw paving the way for a UN climate change conference in Poznan, western Poland, in December.

"The ministers were very clear that the financial crisis should not be an excuse to slow down action on climate change and we should continue to implement what was agreed in the Bali action plan," in December 2007, he said.

"Some people feel that there are possibilities to act on climate change in such a way that you also very clearly address economic interests that are related to the financial crisis," said de Boer, head of the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change.

Host Poland on Monday suggested a joint declaration on the financial crisis but a draft was abandoned Tuesday. "We don't have time and people don't want to spend time negotiating a declaration -- we need to use the time here to decide what will be the main focus in Poznan," de Boer insisted.

The Poznan talks are meant to be a stepping stone towards a treaty to brake emissions from fossil fuels beyond 2012 and support developing countries in climate change's firing line. The international community has set a December 2009 deadline to set a final framework to fight climate change after the first phase of the Kyoto Protocol on limiting climate change expires in December 2012.

Environmental groups including Greenpeace insist world leaders must strike a deal that will limit greenhouse gas emissions enough to prevent temperatures from rising over two degrees Celsius by the end of the century. Any rise exceeding the two degrees Celsius limit would entail catastrophic consequences including widespread flooding and increased morbidity due to heatwaves and drought, ecologists warn.

(AFP, 14/10/2008)