A CLOUD of doubt has formed over the Rio+20 Earth Summit after countries failed to agree on acceptable language just two weeks before 120 world leaders arrive at the biggest United Nations event of its kind ever organised.  Members of the judiciary, however, could prove formidable in salvaging the process.

Forty years ago, the world's leaders met to discuss our perilous dependency on a stressed global environment. In Stockholm then, as in Rio now, innovation was key. But at Rio+20, negotiators need to look a lot harder at the nature, depth and scope of inclusion in innovation if they are to map out a more equitable, socially just and sustainable future.

BEIJING — China said Monday wealthy countries should take the lead in tackling climate change, repeating its long-held stance ahead of a global UN summit on poverty and the environment in Rio de Janeiro.

Guardian development readers need no reminding of the scale and urgency of global challenges such as the economic crisis, our self-destructive drift to climate crisis, or the scandal of 1 billion people going to bed hungry every night. We're all painfully aware that our collective responses are fragmented and inadequate, undermined by differences of view and our apparent inability to act on the profound links between these issues.

The Brazilian government is giving poor nations from Africa and the Caribbean a free air lift to boost attendance at the United Nations conference on sustainable development that it is hostingin Rio de Janeiro.

By their own admission, it is an "extraordinary" group of leaders from across business, NGOs, trade unions and science that have come together to find a new path towards sustainable development. But then again, these are extraordinary times.

RIO DE JANEIRO, 14 June 2012 (IRIN) - “The pace is too slow” and “there is a lack of urgency”, grumbled a negotiator as preparatory talks on the final political outcome document limped back into motion on 13 June at the UN Conference on Sustainable Development, also known Rio+20, in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. 

The Rio+20 Earth summit must take decisive action on population and consumption regardless of political taboos or it will struggle to tackle the alarming decline of the global environment, the world's leading scientific academies warned on Thursday.

Barack Obama will skip a United Nations summit billed as a "once-in-a-generation opportunity" to make progress on global development, sending Hillary Clinton in his place.