Delegates and scientists from around the world have opened a key UN climate summit aiming to build a new pact to combat global warming.

A major climate change conference opened on the Indonesian resort island of Bali Monday, with an aim to breathe new life into the troubled 15-year-old global climate treaty and to reach a deal on what should replace the Kyoto Protocol, which ends in 2012.

Talks will center on whether binding targets are needed to cut emissions. It will also debate how to help poor nations cope in a warming world.

The annual high-level meeting, organized by the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), is under pressure to deliver a global agreement on how to cut rising greenhouse gas emissions.

Over the past years, climate change talks have been bogged down by arguments over who's going to pay the bill for cleaner technology and how to share out the burden of emissions curbs between rich and poor nations.

The bottom line is no nation at the Bali talks wants its economy to suffer by implementing strict emissions curbs. But climate scientists say time is running out.

HE/BGH