* WHY IS A NEW TREATY NEEDED?

-- The UN Climate Panel last year blamed human activities, led by burning fossil fuels, for a warming that it said will bring ever more droughts, heatwaves, floods and rising seas.

The panel said that world emissions of greenhouse gases -- now rising fast -- would have to peak by about 2015 and then fall sharply to limit a rise in global temperatures to no more than 2 Celsius (3.6 Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial times.

Spurred by the panel's findings, governments agreed in Bali, Indonesia, in December 2007 to work out a new climate treaty by the end of 2009 to succeed Kyoto. Bangkok will be the first stop on the "Bali roadmap".

* SO WHAT'S WRONG WITH THE KYOTO PROTOCOL?

-- Kyoto obliges 37 developed nations to cut greenhouse gas emissions by an average of at least 5 percent below 1990 levels by 2012. The Bangkok talks will be about widening action to all nations.

Every rich country except the United States has ratified Kyoto. President George W. Bush rejected the pact in 2001, saying it would cost US jobs and unfairly omitted 2012 emissions targets for developing nations such as China and India.

The Bush administration has agreed to take part in talks on a long-term treaty even though many details will be agreed after Bush steps down in January 2009. The main US presidential candidates say they are committed to stepping up US action.

Developing nations say they are willing to do more to curb the growth of their emissions -- but reject Kyoto-style caps because they need to use more energy to reduce poverty.

* WHAT WILL BE ACHIEVED IN BANGKOK?

-- Bangkok's main task is to agree a work programme for the next two years -- the details may show how urgently governments want to tackle climate change. After Bangkok, negotiators will meet in Bonn in June, again in August in a city yet to be decided and environment ministers will meet in Poznan, Poland, in December. Bangkok is symbolically important as the first step on the road to a deal to be agreed in Copenhagen in late 2009.

* BUT KYOTO RUNS TO 2012: WHAT'S THE HURRY?

-- The United Nations says that a new treaty needs to be in place by the end of 2009 to give national parliaments time to ratify before Kyoto runs out. A big worry is that it took two years to negotiate Kyoto and then eight to get it ratified.

And investors need time -- a power company trying to decide whether to build a coal-fired plant or a wind farm wants to know the rules on greenhouse gas emissions as soon as possible.

* WHAT ARE THE STUMBLING BLOCKS TO A NEW TREATY?

-- A main issue will be how to ensure a fair share-out of the burden of curbs on greenhouse gases between rich and poor.

Developing nations want more green technologies, credits for slowing deforestation and far more aid to help them adapt to the impact of climate change such as droughts and rising seas.

"We are still investigating the report about the road. APP doesn't have anything to do with illegal activities and we are checking the legality of our wood supplies," Aida Greenbury, director of sustainability at APP, said by telephone.

According to Eyes of the Forest, the logging highway could have a devastating effect on Kampar's peat forests, one of the largest of the contiguous tropical peat forests which act as the planet's biggest carbon store.

"Drainage and plantation development activities on the top of the Kampar peat dome could even cause the peat dome to collapse and emit large amounts of carbon," Eyes of the Forest said in a statement.

It said the Kampar peninsula area is also home to around 60 Sumatran tigers, the most critically endangered of the world's tiger subspecies. There are an estimated 400-500 Sumatran tigers left.

Eyes of the Forest coordinator Nursamsu said in the statement that their investigators had come across tiger tracks along the logging road last month.

"But the tigers of Kampar don't stand a chance once APP begins logging full-scale and the poachers discover there's easy access to this critical tiger habitat."

Greenbury of APP said its policy on wood supplies was one of the most stringent in the world and complied with the law.

"We listen and have an open door policy to any input given by any stakeholders including NGOs. We haven't got any information regarding this allegation."

Green groups have frequently accused APP of destroying natural forest in Indonesia, accusations denied by the firm.

According to Greenpeace, Indonesia had the fastest pace of deforestation in the world between 2000 and 2005, with an area of forest equivalent to 300 soccer pitches destroyed every hour.

Trees store carbon dioxide, the main greenhouse gas, as they grow and emit it when they burn or rot. Peat swamps are also big natural stores of carbon.

APP is one of the world's leading pulp and paper companies with combined pulp, paper and packaging capacity in Indonesia of more than 7 million tonnes, according to its Web site.