France's Fabius says climate talks were constructive

PARIS (Reuters) - French foreign minister Laurent Fabius said on Tuesday that climate ministers had made some progress in preparatory talks for reaching an ambitious agreement on global warming at the end of the year. "The meeting was constructive," Fabius said in a statement. "our goal is ambitious, but I am confident." Delegations from around 40 countries met in Paris on Monday and Tuesday for informal talks on a United Nations deal to slow global warming, less than six months before France hosts a summit in December. The United Nations says national plans for curbing greenhouse gas emissions, submitted as the building blocks of a Paris agreement, will not be enough to limit warming to a U.N. goal of 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial levels. French President Francois Hollande concurred, as he addressed a panel of religious leaders and intellectuals gathered in Paris, and urged world leaders to improve their contributions. "With the accord that we could have based on the current state of negotiations and the contributions submitted by governments, we are still above 2 degrees, probably 3 degrees," he said. (Reporting by Michel Rose and Emmanuel Jarry; Editing by Susan Fenton)