Countries call for help from richer nations

The leaders of nine nations in the Amazon have met to discuss key climate change issues ahead of next month's Copenhagen conference and have called on richer nations to help poorer counties to protect their rainforests.

Leaders from Bolivia, Guyana, Peru, Venezuela, Surinam, Colombia and Ecuador met at the meeting in Brazil, with the president of France Nicholas Sarkozy appearing on behalf of French Guiana.

The president of Brazil, Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, chaired the meeting and said that the nations want to preserve the endangered rainforests - but that other countries have to pay for the protection.

"Let no gringo [foreigner] ask us to let an Amazonian starve to death under a tree," he said.

Next month, more than 40 world leaders are set to meet in Denmark to try and come up with a global climate change strategy to replace the existing Kyoto protocol set out in 1997.

Written by Kimberley Homer.

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