Fears are growing that the COP15 Copenhagen Climate Summit may end without a global climate agreement, with grass roots organisations and even leading politicians suggesting the road to an agreement is an uphill battle.

“It’s an uphill struggle,” British Prime Minister Gordon Brown tells the BBC adding that if agreement is not reached in Copenhagen this week “people will doubt whether we will get an agreement at all.”

Brown’s statement mirrored a similar one made by Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel last week that she was nervous about the Copenhagen conference.

Grass roots organisations too are expressing their concerns, even going as far as saying the conference is in crisis.

“It is very worrying. The world’s leaders will have to show leadership if we are to get out of this crisis,” says David Turnbull, the director of Climate Action Network, which represents 450 grass roots organisations such as Oxfam, Greenpeace and Danchurchaid.

Earlier today, in an interview with The Financial Times, U.N. Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon suggested that one of the main bones of contention in Copenhagen – the long-term funding of developing countries – need not be determined in Copenhagen but could be addressed next year.

The G-77 Spokesman Lumumba Stanislaus D-Aping retorted in an interview with Politiken that current G-77 policy was that it would only accept an agreement if it contained concrete figures.

“There must be concrete figures in the agreement. That is the only security we have that money will be paid. This is both for short-term financing and long-term financing. Otherwise we face a very bleak future,” Lumumba Stanislaus Di-Aping told politiken.dk.

Quotes are translated from Danish