Chaotic Monday

Yesterday I attended the conference at the Bella Center in Copenhagen. It was a great but exhausting experience. I started queuing up just after 0700 o'clock for accreditation (1 hour before the accreditation opened). If I had arrvied 15 minutes later I would have been amongst the estimated 10000 that not got in. After 3 hours in a queue that barely moved, with probably less than 100 people in front of med, I finally got in.

There I met my friends and former colleges from Bellona, and got information about the events if the day. At 1130 the meeting for the Ministers and State Secretaries was planned to start and I decided to listen in on this event.

For those of you who that have read the newspaper, you know that the negotiation broke down because the African nations refused to negotiate any further before the rich countries made a commitment to continue the Kyoto protocol regardless of the outcome of COP15. They did not show up at the meeting, and all kind of rumors were in circulaton. We were wating, as well as all the remaining Ministers. For instance the Norwegian minister Solheim sat there waiting for at least 2 hours. So instead of waiting I tried to attend the side event with Al gore and Støre, but the room was aleady full. But I was not alone outside. One of Norways biggest TV-channels did not make it in either... With the main negotiation delayed for an unspecified time, I waited for a while before I had to leave to reach my plane home.

So what did I learn? It's less than a week left, and some parties are still discussing how emissions should be measured.. i.e. they are not even close to discuss targest and obligations. It's still two different draft texts and as it says on the front page on one: "The Chair would like to stress that nothing will be agreed until everything else is agreed."

But the rumors say that Denmark will submit a new draft text on Wednesday morgning as an attempt to discuss one instead of two documents. I wish Denmark good luck and hope this one is better than the previous one.