Plastic pollution treaty stalled as Geneva talks end without deal

(Reuters) — Delegates discussing the world’s first legally binding treaty to tackle plastic pollution failed to reach consensus, diplomats said on Friday, voicing disappointment and even rage that the 10-day talks produced no deal.

Delegates had been seeking a breakthrough in the deadlocked United Nations’ talks in Geneva, but states pushing for an ambitious treaty said that the latest text released overnight failed to meet their expectations.

The chair of the negotiations Ecuador’s Luis Vayas Valdivieso adjourned the session with a pledge to resume talks at an undetermined later date, drawing weak applause from exhausted delegates who had worked into the early hours.

French ecology minister Agnes Pannier-Runacher told the meeting’s closing session that she was “enraged because despite genuine efforts by many, and real progress in discussions, no tangible results have been obtained.”

In an apparent reference to oil-producing nations, Colombia’s delegate Haendel Rodriguez said a deal had been “blocked by a small number of states who simply did not want an agreement.”

Diplomats and climate advocates had warned earlier this month that efforts by the European Union and small island states to cap virgin plastic production – fueled by petroleum, coal and gas – faced opposition from petrochemical-producing countries and the U.S. under President Donald Trump.

U.S. delegate John Thompson from the State Department declined to comment as he left the talks.

The path forward for the negotiations is uncertain.

U.N. officials and some countries, including Britain, said that negotiations should resume but others described a broken process.