Russia's State Duma lower house of parliament today ratified the Kyoto Protocol to clear the way for the long-delayed climate-change treaty to come into force worldwide.
Russian ratification pushes the 126-nation UN pact, aimed at battling global warming through curbing greenhouse gas emissions, over the threshold of 55 per cent of developed nations' emissions needed to make it internationally binding.
Today's vote in the State Duma, controlled by pro-Kremlin parties, is the key to ratification.
The bill still has to go through the upper house and be signed into law by its key advocate, President Vladimir Putin.