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DURBAN, South
Africa (AP) — A U.N. climate conference reached a hard-fought
agreement Sunday on a far-reaching program meant to set a new course for
the global fight against climate change.

The
194-party conference agreed to start negotiations on a new accord that
would ensure that countries will be legally bound to carry out any
pledges they make. It would take effect by 2020 at the latest.

The
deal doesn’t explicitly compel any nation to take on emissions targets,
although most emerging economies have volunteered to curb the growth of
their emissions.

Currently, only industrial
countries have legally binding emissions targets under the 1997 Kyoto
Protocol. Those commitments expire next year, but they will be extended
for at least another five years under the accord adopted Sunday – a key
demand by developing countries seeking to preserve the only existing
treaty regulating carbon emissions.

The
proposed Durban Platform offered answers to problems that have bedeviled
global warming negotiations for years about sharing the responsibility
for controlling carbon emissions and helping the world’s poorest and
most climate-vulnerable nations cope with changing forces of nature.