2011 hottest year globally - World Meteorological Organisation

PanARMENIAN.Net - The world is getting hotter, with 2011 one of the warmest years on record, and humans are to blame, a report by the World Meteorological Organisation said.It warned increasing global average temperatures were expected to amplify floods, droughts and other extreme weather patterns.

"Our science is solid and it proves unequivocally that the world is warming and that this warming is due to human activities," WMO Deputy Secretary-General Jerry Lengoasa told reporters in Durban, where almost 200 nations are gathered for U.N. climate talks.

The WMO report was released to coincide with U.N. climate talks which run until December 9 in Durban aimed at trying to reach agreement on cutting planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions.

Prospects for a meaningful agreement appear bleak with the biggest emitters the United States and China unwilling to take on binding cuts until the other does first. Major players Japan, Canada and Russia are unwilling to extend commitments that expire next year and the European Union is looking at 2015 as a deadline for reaching a new global deal.

There has been an emerging surge of support for an EU plan to have a new global deal reached by 2015 and in force by 2020 that includes countries not bound by the Kyoto Protocol. "Not only the EU but other countries share the same goal in one way or another," chief Japanese climate envoy Masahiko Horie told a news conference.

Japan is looking at a single, comprehensive legal document. Horie did not say Japan was on board with the European Union but signalled that Tokyo agreed with the principles of the plans laid out by Brussels, Reuters reported.