COPENHAGEN SOUND AND FURY SIGNIFYING NEXT YEAR

Leaders try to rescue Copenhagen climate talks as Obama rebukes China
Sam Coates, December 18, 2009 (UK Times)

"World leaders ditched their advisers at Copenhagen and are attempting to thrash out a compromise on their own as Britain warned that the climate change summit is on the brink of failure.

"Leaders of 25 nations will attempt to salvage the bare bones of an agreement after negotiations overnight went "backwards" and the first set-piece meeting of the day made little progress because of repeated obstructions by the Chinese delegation."

From joellakris via YouTube

"President Obama disappointed delegates by failing to offer any new pledges in his much-anticipated speech, although he hinted there might be concessions later…Wen Jiabao, the Chinese Premier, also signalled unhappiness over the proposals on ‘verification,’ the mechanism to ensure countries keep their climate change promises…Mr Obama warned that the Chinese must soften its objections…

"The only movement so far… was a bigger financial commitment from President Lula of Brazil…India said they wanted more talks in 2010, while President Sarkozy of France blamed China for preventing a deal…[though it is not] likely until a deal on finding $100 billion to help developing countries to reduce carbon emissions can be struck…"

He can't do it alone. From AssociatedPress via YouTube

"…[Reportedly] the overnight discussions went badly. No progress was made and, in some areas, the talks went backwards…Rather than focusing on the substance of a deal, a huge row broke out on the technical status of the final agreement and whether it could be converted into a legally binding document over the next year…[T]wo versions of a final agreement still remained on the table — one from the developed world and one from the developing world…[T]he basics of a deal are unclear – some countries are dragging their feet over signing up to limit temperature increases to 2C by 2050.

"World leaders had to fight their way past enormous delegations just to get to their meeting room…For 105 painful minutes, they tried to get the talks back on track, going point-by-point through the text of a draft agreement released at 8am…Lars Lokke Rasmussen, the Danish Prime Minister, did his best to keep the meeting in order…Mr Rasmussen went through the outline of the agreement [but was] blocked by the Chinese…Irritation set in as the Chinese…made clear the language in the draft agreement on "verification" …was still completely unacceptable…[When the frustration became palpable] Mr Rasmussen called for an hour-long break…[On the brink of failure] world leaders gathered for a second time…"