COP15 gearing up for make-or-break finale, COP15

Release Date: 2009-12-15

World leaders “face a defining moment in history”, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said as the Copenhagen conference formally entered its high-level stage Tuesday

As heads of states and governments were beginning to arrive at Copenhagen, a ceremony Tuesday marked the formal opening of the final high-level stage of the ongoing UN conference on climate change, COP15.

“We know what we must do. We know what the world expects. Our job here and now is to seal the deal, a deal in our common interest,” UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon said according to AFP, while adding that the world’s leaders face “a defining moment in history”.

The Secretary-General also said that “three years of effort have come down to three days of action. Let us not falter in the home stretch. No one will get everything they want in this negotiation”.

According to Reuters, Ban Ki-moon labeled the negotiations lying ahead over the next three days as “the most complex and ambitious ever to be undertaken by the world community”.

In her address the conference president, Danish minister Connie Hedegaard, said “In these very hours we are balancing between success and failure. Success is within reach. But (…) I must also warn you: We can fail.”

Type:	NORMAL
Company:	COP15
Country:	Denmark