Doha was never expected to break much new ground as far as the recent UN Summit goes, but when all is said and done it had a number of pivotal and key issues on the agenda ranging from rescuing the Kyoto Protocol and finance to compensation for poor countries suffering the effects of climate change and how to structure a proposed new global climate change agreement.

As has become typical of most recent summits, the climate change talks remained deadlocked virtually until the final day and on the day itself.

Sometimes the best of deals are struck under given circumstances only when frustration and confusion tends to be getting the better of most delegates.

It was good of the EU to set deadlines even though it knew that they would be broken but at the same time it showed a sense of leadership at a most delicate moment.

While 2015 seems predestined to remain the year when the accord, if reached, will be signed, it is not expected to come into force until five years later – 2020.

There has been some criticism about the host country’s level of preparedness in terms of negotiating skills, but only time will tell whether this was justified or mere anti-Arab prejudice. Particularly since we could only monitor from afar while the Maltese government struggled in vain for its own survival to the extent of even expecting us to act like members of a coalition government to bail it out and offer it a lifeline that its own members had understandably refused to do.

Where one might offer a degree of criticism is in the sense that many were expecting the Gulf states – particularly Qatar itself to put forward their own plans for cutting emissions and providing money for poor countries, but sometimes this is the best excuse to deflect attention from those who were really expected to deliver the goods.

What struck me as Doha inched towards wrapping the summit up, was an interview in Der Spiegel with a senior German government adviser, Kai Konrad who accused both Berlin itself and the EU of taking the wrong approach to motivate others on this issue – so much so that he was reported to have claimed that Europe shouldn’t have tried so hard to save the planet!

The debatable but understandable point that he made was that he tended to equate the climate scenario with a situation where a child is in danger of falling into a pond. If one of the adults present says that he or she will definitely jump in if it happens, then no one else is going to bother getting wet.

His main point was that the EU needed to make clear to China, the US and the large developing nations that Germany and Europe were no longer going to try to save the climate ALONE.

With China firmly in his mind and as main target, the German top gun said it wouldn’t advance negotiations if we make so many concessions to China’s position that there is no more movement at all.

When the Kyoto Protocol was in fact extended by an additional eight years to 2020, there were considerable protests from larger, wealthier nations who emit more carbon. In fact Russia, Japan and Canada had already resigned from the treaty while the US never ratified it.

It is true that the treaty represents only 15 per cent coverage of the world’s greenhouse gas emissions, most represented by the EU and Australia but it remains the only legal framework one can rely on.

Those who were hoping that the devastation wrought by Hurricane Sandy in the US would prompt the Americans to support more stringent measures to curb emissions miscalculated badly. In fact at one stage the leading US delegate was reported to have explained that there would be no change in policy coming from Washington.

At the end of every summit much blame is pinned on lack of political will. This seems to have been the case this time round too.

On the positive side, the summit will mean that rich nations will actually have to compensate poorer ones for losses they suffer due to global warming.

Some are concerned that this agreement could cost the wealthy nations billions of dollars.

There was talk that the British economy would have to fork out some £23 billion by 2020.

With the USA, China and Japan refusing to sign up to similar commitments, this left businesses in the UK and other European countries at what they perceived as a competitive disadvantage.

Climate sceptics and climate ‘realists’ have been arguing that by pursuing new emission targets certain countries were only accelerating a process of reindustrialisation in Europe, as a result of which manufacturing jobs would end up being transported elsewhere.

On the other hand, environmental groups continued to express their frustration at an undoubtedly protracted process and lack of progress that has been made in successive climate change talks over the years. By now…the 18th year!

In actual fact, the tense talks finally ended neither without any firm commitments to reduce carbon emissions nor on climate change aid. It is my strictly personal opinion that even if Doha had been better managed, the end and / or net result would have remained the same. Since political will or lack of it remain of the essence.

To be optimistic, one can say that the dismal legacy of Copenhagen has been cleared up, so one can still hope in hope of a comprehensive agreement in three years time.

Although public awareness re climate change has increased over the years it is still not considered an issue of immediacy but rather a probable or possible future threat.

As British Labour Shadow Secretary for Energy and Climate Change recently said – we have to find a way to bring the public with us on climate.

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