Prime Minister Taro Aso announced Japan's mid-term target ahead of a December meeting in Copenhagen set to hammer out a new climate treaty that will replace the Kyoto Protocol when it expires in 2012.

"I have decided to aim at a 15 percent reduction from 2005," Aso told a news conference -- setting a target that translates to an eight percent cut from 1990 levels, the benchmark year used in United Nations talks.

Aso said "Japan must take the initiative in spearheading a global trend," arguing that the target surpasses US and European goals because, unlike theirs, it does not factor in carbon trading or sequestration through forestry.

Japan's figure is far below the target announced by the European Union, which has said it would slash emissions by 20 percent from 1990 levels, or by 30 percent if others set a similarly ambitious goal.

Japan's target has already drawn criticism from environmental groups, who described the goal as "too small (for Japan) to take the lead" in international negotiations on a global pact to combat climate change.

Emerging and developing economies are also expected to scorn Japan's target after calling on industrialised nations to curb their emissions of heat-trapping gases by 40 percent.

Japan -- the world's number two economy, and the fifth largest emitter of greenhouse gases -- argues it has already achieved a highly energy-efficient lifestyle and industrial infrastructure.

Aso also said that "international fairness is very important. Even if harsh responsibility is imposed on only Japan, Japanese companies and factories will merely shift to countries that act less responsibly."

Japan has promised to help reduce emissions that cause climate change by boosting the transfer of green technologies to poor countries.

Environmental group WWF Japan has lashed out at the target, saying it is far below a minimum 15 percent reduction over 1990 that the group has campaigned for.

The goal -- which translates to an eight percent cut of heat-trapping gases on 1990 levels -- is "dangerously lacking any level of ambition," Kim Carstensen, the leader of WWF's Climate Initiative, said in a statement.

"This is a great shame... Aso's decision, influenced by polluters rather than the public, makes reaching a good deal even harder," he said.

Kimiko Hirata of Kiko Network, part of an alliance of green groups called the Climate Action Network, said earlier that businesses had lobbied the Japanese government to allow them to skirt tough commitments.

"The (government) responds to industry, not to science," she said.

Using the 2005 benchmark would ignore a surge in emissions that occurred between 1990 and the middle of this decade, but would neatly accommodate the fall expected as a result of the current recession, the campaigners said.

Under the 1997 Kyoto Protocol, Japan agreed to curb emissions of heat-trapping gases by six percent by the end of 2012 over 1990 levels, but levels actually rose by more than eight percent.

In the longer term, Japan and the European Union agree that the global target should be a 50 percent emission cut by 2050, but they disagree on which year should be the base to calculate the target.

US climate envoy meets Chinese officials on emission cuts
The US special envoy for climate change has met with top Chinese officials here, both sides said Tuesday, as he tries to convince Beijing to commit to greenhouse gas emission cuts.

Todd Stern arrived here on Sunday on a mission that he said would include pressing China to agree to hard numbers on emission reductions under the next treaty on global warming, to be hammered out in Copenhagen in December.

In a meeting on Monday, Vice Premier Li Keqiang reiterated to Stern that developing countries like China should be held to a different standard, according to a statement posted on the Chinese foreign ministry's website.

However, the statement gave no clues on whether some compromise might eventually be reached between the world's number one and two emitters of the gases blamed for raising the earth's temperature.

"China would like to maintain the principle of 'common but differentiated responsibilities', actively participate in negotiations and play a constructive role to promote positive results from the Copenhagen conference," Li was quoted as saying.

A US embassy official said Stern also met with China's National Development and Reform Commission deputy chief Xie Zhenhua, who heads climate change talks, but said he had no details of the meeting.

"China is making strides in clean energy technology," the official told AFP on condition of anonymity.

"However, it will need to commit to more robust and quantifiable actions to put the world on a pathway to a clean-energy, low-carbon future."

The two countries agreed to set up a joint technology research and development centre and an expert work team on technology transfer, foreign ministry spokesman Qin Gang told reporters, without providing details.

More than 180 nations are working on a new climate treaty set for discussion in Copenhagen to cover the period after 2012, when the existing Kyoto Protocol expires.

US President Barack Obama has vowed to tackle climate change in a sharp departure from his predecessor George W. Bush, who rejected the Kyoto Protocol because it made no demands of developing nations.

While saying developing countries like China did not need to make the same cuts as developed nations, Stern has also said any actions by other nations would be futile without commitments by developing countries.

China, however, has stood firm in its position that the bulk of the responsibility for emissions cuts lies with developed nations, while not clearly ruling out making some cuts of its own.

"In this regard, some developed countries should take the lead in reducing gas emissions in order to make the negotiation fruitful," the state-run Xinhua news agency said in a commentary last week ahead of Stern's visit.

The commentary took aim at perceived signs that developed countries might try to dodge their share of the pain.

"But the fact is, a few developed countries have been trying to (shirk) their duties and change the basic principles of the climate talks," it said.

Liu Qing, a Sino-US relations expert at the China Institute of International Studies, said China might promise further policy steps.

"I think China can make a policy promise to take concrete measures to cut its greenhouse gas emissions, such as by reducing small thermal power plants and developing and using new energy sources," Li said.

"But I do not agree on setting a fixed quantity of greenhouse gas emissions for China because we as a developing country are different from America."

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