Diplomatic sources said Canada's Environment Minister Stephane Dion, the conference host, had arranged a meeting of 30 key countries in the talks on Tuesday morning in a bid to get talks moving again.

More than 100 ministers were to gather in Montreal later in the day for the start of the main part of the UN climate change conference that has been going on since November 28. The conference ends Friday.

Much of the debate is centred on whether developing countries that under the Kyoto protocol do not have to cut emissions of greenhouse gases should be included in new committments to come into effect after 2012.

The conference is discussing the 1992 UN climate change convention and holding the first follow up meeting to the Kyoto protocol which came into effect in February, but which has been rejected by the United States and Australia.

Countries are trying to agree on whether the general committments made under the convention and the specific committments to cut emissions of carbon dioxide and other global warming gases should be extended.

Under the Kyoto protocol, industrial countries must start examining new pollution restrictions -- to come into effect from 2012 -- this year.

Diplomatic sources said little progress had been made, despite negotiations that went on late into Monday night.

The Group of 77 developing countries have insisted that the industrialised powers must still bear the brunt of any new post-Kyoto restrictions. One of the reasons the United States refused to ratify Kyoto was because major polluters such as China and India were not affected by the accord.

Backed by the European Union and Japan, the Canadian minister said that cooperation must be as wide as possible to pursue measures after 2012.

He has tried to use the 1992 UN convention as a basis for talks so that the United States, China, India and Brazil are all involved in negotiations.

Many experts say that the emerging industrial powers will have to make committments -- even if they are less restrictive than for the industrialised economies -- for any new effort to work.

A group of 23 US senators -- including four Republicans -- on Monday called on President George W. Bush to take a lead role in global warming negotiations.

"In our view, a deliberate decision by the administration not to engage in such discussions, solely because they may include the topic of future binding emissions reductions requirements, is inconsistent with the obligations of the United States" under the 1992 UN treaty, the senators said in a letter to Bush.

"In any event, the United States should, at a minimum, refrain from blocking or obstructing such discussions amongst parties to the convention, since that would be inconsistent with its ongoing treaty obligations," the letter said.

Some environmental groups say however that the talks should go ahead without the United States so that some progress is made in what they consider to be an ever more crucial battle against global warming.

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