Russia formally ratified the Kyoto Protocol - aimed at curbing global greenhouse gas emissions - on Thursday. In doing so, it triggered a 90-day countdown to bring the international climate treaty into force. The United Nations protocol will become legally binding on 16 February 2005, committing the 30 industrialised countries that have backed it to cutting their greenhouse gas emissions to nearly 5% below 1990 levels. They will have until 2012 to achieve this drop. "This is an historic step forward in the world's efforts to combat a truly global threat," said Kofi Annan, Secretary-General of the UN. The ratification documents, signed by Russian president Vladimir Putin, were handed to Annan by Russia's UN ambassador at a meeting of the Security Council in Nairobi, Kenya. Most importantly, said Annan, Russia's support "ends a long period of uncertainty". The Kyoto Protocol has been in limbo since 1997, when it was first negotiated in Kyoto, Japan. For the protocol to come into force it needed the support of countries that accounted for more than 55% of the industrialised nations' 1990 greenhouse gas emissions. When the US said it would not sign up, this crucial threshold looked out of reach but Russia's support has finally swung it, taking the percentage of emissions covered from 44.2% to 61.6%. "We have a board outside my office tracking the ratifications," says Richard Kinley, acting deputy executive secretary of the UN's climate change secretariat. He says that changing the emission levels on that board was "a symbolic event for me today". We just need to get the American's on board now ... Source: New Scientist