At a breakfast meeting in Singapore, representatives from 21 countries in the Asia-Pacific Economic Co-operation group announced that plans to forge an international agreement on climate change will have to wait.

On Saturday, Prime Minister Stephen Harper cautioned during the APEC meeting that leaders gathered there had significant differences over climate change policy.

Consistent with that view, a consensus emerged in Singapore by early Sunday that it will be hard to come to a post-2012 emissions regime in Copenhagen, Denmark.

Countries from around the world are due to meet in Copenhagen in early December in an attempt to create an emissions control agreement to replace the Kyoto Protocol, which will expire in 2012.

The international community must work together on a climate-change deal to "reduce the risk to the planet," Prime Minister Stephen Harper said Saturday, but both developed and emerging economic powers must be on board so that some countries do not benefit economically while others suffer.

• Watch CTV's Question Period on Sunday for an interview with Trade Minister Stockwell Day on APEC

"We all would agree that climate change is an important international priority that has to be tackled. We have to have a long-term plan that will reduce the risk to the planet," Harper told reporters. "At the same time, we're in the middle of an economic recession, so obviously everybody's also concerned about the impact of that on their economies."

He pointed out that emerging economies, such as China and Indonesia, are responsible for nearly half of all emissions worldwide, a figure that will eventually grow to two-thirds.

"If we don't control those, whatever we do in the developed world will have no impact on climate change," Harper said.

"If everyone is not included, you set up the possible risk that certain countries will gain economic advantage from being included or not included," he added.

Paul Evans, an Asia expert at the University of British Columbia, said one of the goals of the Canadian delegation will be to firm up relations with Asian governments that are becoming increasingly powerful internationally.

"We're holding on by our fingernails to institutions where leadership and the dynamism are increasingly coming from Asia," Evans told CTV News Channel on Saturday. "Mr. Harper is playing catch-up with the United States, with India and China, in trying to be part of those new corridors of power," he said.

Climate change will also be on the summit's agenda on Sunday, when Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd hosts an ad hoc breakfast meeting of all 21 leaders to discuss the issue.

CTV's Graham Richardson, who is travelling with the prime minister, told News Channel on Saturday that the Conservative government has come under fire for its lack of direction on climate change.

The Tories have blamed the Chretien government for signing the 1997 Kyoto Protocol and then failing to meet its aggressive emission-reduction targets, and have vowed to establish a more realistic policy.

However, that policy is not yet clear.

"(The Conservatives) are under some criticism for that and they have been since they came into office," Richardson said Saturday morning. "Many people believe the Harper government never really believed in climate change until most of the world, including the Americans, starting to talk more seriously about it."

Before heading to Singapore on Saturday, U.S. President Barack Obama acknowledged his country is behind on climate-change policy, but is taking steps to catch up.

"Already, the United States has taken more steps to combat climate change in ten months than we have in our recent history: by embracing the latest science, investing in new energy, raising efficiency standards, forging new partnerships, and engaging in international climate negotiations," Obama said Saturday during a speech in Tokyo.

"America knows there is more work to do -- but we are meeting our responsibility, and will continue to do so."

Federal Environment Minister Jim Prentice said Saturday that he's ready to discuss climate change with the rest of the international community. But he affirmed that Alberta's oilsands developments will continue.

Speaking in Edmonton, Prentice said the federal government will try to reduce greenhouse-gas emissions without hurting the economy, at the climate-change meeting in Copenhagen, Denmark, next month.

Representatives from more than 200 countries will gather in Copenhagen on Dec. 7 to try to forge an agreement that will replace the Kyoto Protocol, which expires in 2012.

A few dozen protesters gathered outside the building where Prentice spoke. They called on Ottawa to introduce larger emissions cuts.

With files from The Canadian Press