BAKU: Negotiators raced against the clock at UN climate talks Thursday to broker a potential trillion-dollar deal to help poorer nations tackle global warming after rich and developing countries roundly rejected a draft proposal.

The UN climate summit is supposed to conclude on Friday but is almost certain to run into overtime as nations from the United States to China panned a text released by the Azerbaijani hosts.

The main priority at COP29 in Baku is agreeing a new target to replace the $100 billion a year that rich nations provide poorer ones to reduce emissions and adapt to disaster.

Developing countries plus China, an influential negotiating bloc, are pushing for $1.3 trillion by 2030 and want at least $500 billion of that from developed nations. Major contributors like the European Union have baulked at such demands, and insist private sector money must be counted toward the goal.

The latest draft recognised that developing countries need at least “USD [X] trillion” per year but omitted a concrete figure.

“There is a critical piece of this puzzle missing: the overall number,” said Cedric Schuster, the Samoan chairman of the Alliance of Small Island States, a coalition of nations facing an existential threat from rising seas.

“The time for political games is over.” Ali Mohamed, the chair of the African Group of Negotiators, another important bloc, said the “elephant in the room” was the missing figure.

“This is the reason we are here,” said Mohamed, who is also Kenya’s climate envoy.

Azerbaijan said it would release a shorter, revised draft later Thursday that would contain numbers. UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres, who flew back to Baku after attending COP29’s opening last week, said that negotiators had not yet shifted from initial positions and urged a “final push” for a deal.