Environmental activists left a midyear climate change treaty negotiating session in Bangkok yesterday complaining of too much talk and little action.

The session marked the second time diplomats have gathered since agreeing last year to finish by 2015 an agreement binding all countries to emission cuts that would take effect by 2020.

But even the initial steps of figuring out what that new regime will look like are proving difficult. Some developing countries are angling for new ways to keep the system as it is -- one in which industrialized countries are the only ones enacting mandatory emission cuts. And wealthy countries -- especially the United States -- sparked outrage by insisting that any new agreement remain "flexible," and essentially voluntary for all nations.

"Some parties need to get a reality check and get out of the negotiation 'bubble,'" Tasneem Essop, head of the World Wildlife Fund delegation in Bangkok, said in a statement.

"They need to look the vulnerable in the eye. So we suggest that they use the time between now and Doha [Qatar] to do a field trip to witness first hand the impacts of climate change already being felt," she said. "Maybe this is what we need in order to give those who lack a sense of urgency a wakeup call."

Alex Hanafi, an attorney at the Environmental Defense Fund, called the Bangkok meeting "a rough slog." He pointed to some bright spots for climate action -- most recently Australia and the European Union agreeing to link their carbon markets. But he cautioned that the "balanced package" that diplomats claimed to have achieved in Durban, South Africa, last year is far from secure.

"That delicately balanced package from Durban is wobbly here in Bangkok," Hanafi said. "It needs to be righted before we can get a good outcome in Doha," where diplomats will meet for their annual final round of talks in November.

One major fight this week was over the future of a negotiating track that had dealt with climate finance, adaptation and lifting the ambition of nations to fight climate change. The United States and other industrialized countries argued that under the agreement in Durban, this so-called Long-term Cooperative Action (LCA) track is effectively finished and should be shuttered. Developing countries say work still needs to be done.

Perennial mistrust

The procedural battle underscores the perennial mistrust among nations over global warming. Wealthy countries charge that LCA issues have not been resolved because they can't be, and want to move on with a broad agreement to cut carbon. But behind the scenes they argue that China and other countries have buyer's remorse after signing the Durban deal and are just looking for excuses to back away and keep things the way they are, with developing nations only asked for voluntary carbon cuts.

Developing countries -- specifically a group that called itself "like-minded" nations, including China, Saudi Arabia, Venezuela and Cuba -- argue that the wealthy countries that caused climate change are pulling a bait-and-switch: failing to curb emissions and then making the case to move on and force poorer countries to take on the burden. Once the LCA track ends, analysts said, there is no space in the climate talks to discuss things like the United States taking on comparable emissions cuts to what was set out in the Kyoto Protocol, among other issues.

"It's setting up a big procedural fight in Doha," said Alden Meyer, director of strategy and policy for the Union of Concerned Scientists. "There's a lot of mistrust, and people are wondering how you're going to get a good package in Doha."

Not helping the mistrust, activists said, was U.S. Deputy Envoy for Climate Change Jonathan Pershing, who argued that a future emissions agreement should be "flexible" instead of legally binding and warned that the United States is not likely to ramp up a still-unmet pledge to cut carbon 17 percent below 2005 levels this decade.

Environmental groups attacked Pershing for the comments, and the nongovernmental organization newsletter Eco attacked Pershing for noting that the U.N. climate talks do not produce much fast action.

Meyer said he does not expect an easy outcome in Doha as diplomats struggle to fill in the blanks of the new agreement.

"The reality is you are trying to close the major political decisions on the old regime and launch a three-year process for the new regime. That's very elegant on paper, if you can do it. But it's not that clean."