New Delhi, Dec. 9: A tiny Polynesian island today stalled the Copenhagen climate-change conference for hours with a proposal that amounted to rewriting the global rules on combating emissions and apparently implied deeper cuts by countries such as India and China.

Tuvalu, a nine-island archipelago in the southern Pacific with a population of 12,000, proposed a new protocol that would demand heavier emission cuts from industrialised countries but could also entail cuts for some large emitters among the developing nations.

The proposal from Tuvalu, a member of the Association of Small Island States that are at high peril from rising sea levels, received strong support from other small island states and some of the least developed countries. But China, India, Saudi Arabia and a few other developing countries opposed it, conference observers said.

The Tuvalu proposal related to a new accord that could replace the 12-year-old Kyoto Protocol, climate policy analysts said.

Industrialised countries have signalled they favour an alternative accord that would require all countries to pledge domestic action that could be internationally reviewed. Such an accord, a former negotiator from India said, would erase the distinction between industrialised and developing countries enshrined in the Kyoto Protocol.

The move amplified concerns among some developing countries that the Copenhagen conference might script an epitaph to the Kyoto Protocol — the only international, legally binding agreement that calls on industrialised countries to reduce greenhouse gases through a fixed timetable while not insisting on emission cuts from developing countries.

The atmosphere had already been vitiated by a leaked Danish draft treaty that appeared to sideline the Kyoto Protocol and the UN and hand more power to the wealthy nations. The G77 countries and China claimed the draft was aimed at “superimposing a solution” when world leaders arrived in Copenhagen next week, although India, which had seen the paper earlier, said the text was not a formal proposal.

“This (the Tuvalu proposal) is an attempt to create a rift within the developing countries,” said a climate policy analyst who requested anonymity. “There’s a great game being played, and the objective is to divide the developing countries.”

“It wouldn’t be difficult to do that,” the analyst told The Telegraph. “The G77 is so diverse. There are groups within groups — and not all countries share similar concerns or even similar perceptions about climate change threats.”

Some experts have questioned the merits of continuing with a protocol that was never accepted by the US, one of the largest polluters. The US did not ratify the Kyoto Protocol, arguing that action to limit emissions should also emerge from large emitters such as China and India.

“This may not be the right moment to point this out, but the Kyoto Protocol has some weaknesses — it did not set up strong emission reduction targets for the industrialised countries, and it has weak compliance mechanisms,” said an energy researcher speaking on condition of anonymity.

But developing country negotiators argue that the Kyoto Protocol should be strengthened rather than abandoned.

Amid opposition to Tuvalu’s proposal at the conference today, Danish minister Connie Hedegaard proposed informal consultations to resolve the issue. But Tuvalu blocked the informal discussions and called for a suspension.

“It was suspended about 12.30 until 3pm, but it hasn’t reconvened yet,” Martin Kaiser, the climate policy director with the environmental group Greenpeace, said a little past 4pm Copenhagen time.