Climate pact appears increasingly fragile; U.N. official quits
Pessimism about global climate talks deepened Thursday as Yvo de Boer, the United Nations' top climate official, resigned after struggling for 3 1/2 years to produce a binding legal treaty requiring the world's major emitters of greenhouse gases to slash their carbon output in the coming decades. He will step down July 1 with that goal unmet.
Many observers saw de Boer's resignation as recognition that the U.N. role had been overtaken by the big emitting nations, which hammered out the accord at the last minute in Copenhagen.
