A Cop26 deal was always going to be messy – just look at world trade talks | Larry Elliott

WTO talks show how hard it is to get everyone on the same page - and what goes for trade, goes for climate too

It was a messy compromise. It wasn't nearly enough. In many respects it was a classic example of kicking the can down the road. But Cop26 wasn't the car crash it could have been and, realistically, was always going to end in the way it did, with last-minute haggling over the text.

Why? Because achieving a climate change deal at a meeting of representatives from 197 countries was always going to be tough. While there was general agreement about the need to tackle global heating, there were big differences about how and when to do so.