French negotiators furiously work the backrooms to secure a climate deal

The clock is ticking in Paris as the hosts encourage negotiating blocs to trade demands for more ambition on emissions pledges and financial help to fulfil them

French diplomacy is fighting 23 years of entrenched positions in international climate talks as backroom negotiations continue with the aim of pushing through a draft agreement by Wednesday.

In public, negotiators in Paris were staking out their positions on Tuesday, with the European Union and 79 African, Caribbean and Pacific countries demanding regular reviews to ramp up the ambition of greenhouse gas reduction promises, and the biggest developing countries demanding additional financing pledges and rejecting calculations of how much the rich world has already provided.