G-20 IN SCOTLAND

“It really is important ... that we as finance ministers are engaged in this, because if there isn't an agreement on finance ... then the Copenhagen agreement is going to be much much more difficult,” he said. The G-20 represents around 90 percent of the world's wealth, 80 percent of world trade, and two-thirds of the world's population.

The EU has said that there should be a euro100 billion annual package of public and private finance by 2020 and has urged the U.S. to lay out its position.

But the Obama administration has been preoccupied with prickly domestic issues such as healthcare.

Danish Prime Minister Lars Loekke Rasmussen said it was now “obvious” that the December climate change talks “can't achieve the final result in terms of the new legally binding treaty which goes into all details.”

But he said finance ministers held the key to a final deal, urging them to come up with concrete proposals on funding to help developing nations tackle and cope with a warming climate.

In a speech to the G-20 meeting, he called on officials to set up a global climate fund that “should be ready to work immediately.” He also asked them to keep an open mind on raising funds from new areas such as a global cap-and-trade program for air and sea travel.

The climate issue has been the focus of protests around St. Andrews. A small group of protesters blocked the coastal road Friday night between the town and the nearby resort where the meeting was held by chaining themselves together. On Saturday around 200 demonstrators gathered at West Sands beach on Saturday with a group dressed as bankers sticking their heads in the sand.

There are also divisions among officials over attempts to secure future global growth.

Host country Britain, still mired in recession, is keen to continued international effort to support a still fledging recovery, while other G-20 nations, including the United States, Japan and Germany, want to debate ending measures to boost growth.

The finance ministers and central bankers are trying to find a way to make good on a pledge by world leaders at their September summit in Pittsburgh to subject their economic policies to the scrutiny of a peer review. That process would determine whether each country's efforts were “collectively consistent” with sustainable global growth.

The goal is to avoid repeating problems like huge trade deficits and credit-fueled consumption in the U.S., and massive trade surpluses and savings in China and elsewhere. China's appetite to fund U.S. debt by buying Treasuries was seen as playing a major role in fueling the U.S. housing boom and subsequent collapse.

The G-20 is comprised of Argentina, Australia, Brazil, Britain, Canada, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Russia, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, South Korea, Turkey, the United States and the rotating EU presidency.

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