"Reading the news today it was said it was the French Minister, Dominique Voynet who screwed up the deal just as it had been worked out."

Depends which news you read. My understanding is that John Prescott leant over backward to accomodate the American position - or maybe that should be bent over forwards. It involved a pretty sizeable retreat from what had been promised by the Americans previously at the Kyoto conference.

Then he tried to steamroll the deal through at the last minute, without giving all sufficient details, and the French, backed by other countries, dug their heels in, because it was a compromise too far in their view, and would have legitimised the retreast from tghe minimal reductions that had been promised.

It's been suggested that any kind of deal would have been worth it, given the strong possibility that Bush is going to be sitting in the White House twiddling his thumbs for the next four years - but then the chances are that if he does make it in, he'd rat on the deal anyway.