Week one of the Copenhagen climate talks is hurtling to an end, with the United States and China exchanging delicately worded fire.

It was the delegation of a small Pacific island nation that captured everyone's attention this week, however, by bringing the global talks to a standstill before they'd barely even begun.

Tuvalu is 10 feet above sea level at its highest point. So rising oceans from global warming threaten its survival. On Wednesday, the tiny island nation asked that the climate treaty be formally amended to require much stronger cuts to global greenhouse gas emissions -- in effect taking on the industrial world and oil producing nations before a global audience.

"Tuvalu's gambit, seconded by Grenada, the Solomons and other island states one by one on the floor of the cavernous Bella Center, quickly ran into stiff opposition from oil giant Saudi Arabia," reported the AP, "which would be hurt by sharp rollbacks in fuel use, and from China and India. The U.S. delegation remained silent."

When the Danish president of the conference, Connie Hedegaard, offered to let the question to be discussed outside of the formal negotiation process instead, little Tuvualu worked a procedural move: it asked for the conference to be suspended.

Hedegaard granted the request, and the world climate talks came to an unexpected halt.

Democracy Now! has video of the rally held outside the plenary doors after the meeting was suspended. 

It was a lot of drama just three days into the talks -- but not all that unusual compared to past conferences, according to an NGO staffer I spoke with.

Specifically, Tuvalu asked that the climate treaty be amended to include a legally binding agreement that ensures mean global temperature rise would be held to no more than 1.5 degrees Celsius (2.7 degrees Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial levels by 2100.

The world's richest countries have established a rise of less than 2 degrees C (1.35 degrees F) as a consensus target. But small island nations and other developing countries say that 2 degrees would be fatal to them.

Leadership from either China or the U.S. on the 1.5 degree temperature target might help move the proposal along. But neither is seriously considering the question.

China has made clear that it wants to be considered one of the big dogs. It held those seriously splashy Olympics in Beijing and has been a significant part of negotiations with North Korea over that nation's nuclear arms ambitions.

But at today's press conference of the China delegation, Chinese Vice Foreign Minister He Yafei made the point (no matter exactly what question was asked) that his nation would not agree to the kinds of legally binding emissions targets required of industrialized nations under the current treaty.

China has instead proposed to cut its "energy intensity" by 40-45 percent -- meaning that it would not deal directly with emissions, but instead voluntarily lower its "energy intensity": the amount of fossil fuel energy it uses to produce the same amount of economic activity.

During the press conference, He came fairly close to calling U.S. climate envoy Todd Stern a dummy, saying he "lacked common sense" for suggesting, yesterday, that no U.S. aid dollars would go to China for adaptation to climate change. He put China's interests firmly in the developing world's camp: Rich nations have created the problem of global warming and now have the responsibility to help poorer nations adapt.

Asked about He's comments later in the day, Stern was diplomatic (natch), calling them "unfortunate," and lauding He as a "smart man." Stern suggested that while the most needy nations should be first to receive aid dollars, a major developing nation like China could be the beneficiary of private investment via global carbon markets.

He also stated that the U.S. would not affirm any agreement that doesn't include the major developing countries -- generally understood to be China, India, Brazil, and sometimes Russia and South Africa as well -- "stepping up and taking significant action."

"The climate clock has ticked down to zero," in the words of UN climate chief Yvo de Boer. But the U.S. and China are still dancing one around the other, as they have been for much of the year.

Each wants its vision of the world, its own needs, to dominate whatever agreement may come out of the Copenhagen talks.

This week, though, Tuvalu showed that small nations have the means to make themselves heard above the Sino-American din.

On to week two!

 See more of Emily's reports from Copenhagen as part of OnEarth's ongoing coverage.