BAKU: The United Nations climate body on Thursday published a fresh set of options for the COP29 summit's primary goal of agreeing how much money richer countries should provide to poorer ones to help them deal with climate change.

Getting a deal on the money has proven slow-going at the talks in Baku, Azerbaijan, and the latest draft of the negotiating text arrived several hours later than scheduled as delegates entered, in theory, the last 48 hours of the event.

While the summit is due to close on Friday, the new document showed much is still to be determined on the main questions: what counts towards the annual figure, who pays and how much.

The 10-page document contained a range of options but avoided specifying the total amount of money that countries would aim to invest each year, leaving the space marked with an 'X'.

That was perhaps not surprising given key donor countries, including those in the European Union, have said they want to see more clarity on the structure and contributor base before publicly discussing how much they could chip in.

(Reporting by William James and Simon Jessop)