It has been a bumpy ride, with developed countries failing to make definite commitments and India hinting at a shift of stance. THE last leg of the climate change talks held in Barcelona, Spain, on November 2-6 in the run-up to the all-important 15th Conference of the Parties (COP-15) to the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC) in Copenhagen in December did not result in any dramatic development that could break the impasse in the negotiations, which has been in evidence since the June meeting in Bonn where the 200-page Negotiating Text, including the proposals of Japan and Australia and an Implementing Agreement of the United States, was drafted; it was later consolidated and adopted (along with all the multitude of square brackets) in Bangkok. Copenhagen is expected to provide answers to three key issues: What legally binding carbon emission reduction targets will developed (Annex-1) countries commit to? What actions will major developing (non-Annex-1) countries take to limit theirs? How will the emission mitigation and adaptation to climate change by developing countries be supported and managed with finance and technology? The contours of the negotiations at COP-15 are already apparent. Copenhagen, in all likelihood, will not produce any agreement on the commitments and actions of developed and developing countries respectively in the post-2012 phase of the Kyoto Protocol (KP) that is acceptable to all the parties. Nor is it likely to resolve issues of money and technology. In fact, there is an imminent danger of a virtual termination of the Kyoto Protocol (which came into force in 2005), the dismantling of the Bali Action Plan (BAP) formulated at COP-13 in December 2007 as the guiding road map towards Copenhagen, and the undermining of the basic tenet of