Combating climate change: science in the forefront

International negotiations concerning the climate have never been the subject of as much media attention since the report of the International Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in 1991 and the drafting of the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change in the following year on the occasion of the Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro. The Kyoto Protocol at the third Conference of the Parties (COP 3) in 1997 was the first international accord ever signed to reduce global emission of greenhouse..