Germany expects tough negotiations with the United States on climate protection at the G8 summit to be held in the northern town of Heiligendamm in early June, a government spokesman said in Berlin Tuesday. Talks ahead of the summit had not produced satisfactory results thus far, said Bernd Pfaffenbach, a secretary of state in the Economics Ministry tasked with preparing the June 6-8 meeting, DPA reported. Chancellor Angela Merkel aimed to make climate change a central theme at the summit, being held under the German G8 presidency, Pfaffenbach reiterated. He indicated government disappointment that the US was not yet prepared to submit to an internationally agreed climate protection regime along the lines of the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, which runs out in 2012. Pfaffenbach expressed optimism that criticism by non-governmental organizations, which have voiced strident protest at past G8 summits, would be muted this time. Merkel intended to meet NGO representatives in mid-May, and the NGOs had welcomed the fact that the chancellor intended to place Africa high on the agenda, he said. G8 members aimed to offer African countries a "broad political partnership" with the aim of promoting democracy and reducing corruption, Pfaffenbach said. He stressed that money was not the solution to everything, although the industrialized countries stood by their longstanding commitments, including allocating 0.7 per cent of gross domestic product to development aid by 2012. African countries needed to improve their governmental structures and to attract more private capital, he said.
