Mixed reactions to Brazil deal as fossil fuels exit plan left hanging

Many others gave the deal lukewarm praise as the best that could be achieved in trying times, while others complained about the package or the process that led to its approval.

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"Given the circumstances of geopolitics today, we're actually quite pleased with the bounds of the package that came out," said Palau Ambassador Ilana Seid, who chaired the small island nations coalition.

"The alternative is that we don't get a decision and that would have been a worse alternative."

Brazil said a separate roadmap to transition away from fossil fuels will be published later, but it will not carry the binding weight of a UN-approved agreement. The decision frustrated campaigners who had hoped for a formal commitment at the Brazil talks to phase out oil, gas and coal.

Delegates from vulnerable nations argued that without a clear fossil-fuel exit plan, promises to protect the planet would ring hollow.

Panama's Juan Carlos Monterrey Gomez warned that "a climate decision that cannot even say 'fossil fuels' is not neutrality, it is complicity".