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400 detained in preventive raid
Photo: AFP
Helena Christensen speaks to crowd
Photo: AP

Tens of thousands protest worldwide for 'Climate Justice'

Police detains some 600 demonstrators in Copenhagen after thousands march toward UN conference in protest of nations' poor action against global warming

Industrial countries criticized a draft global warming pact Saturday for not making stronger demands on major developing countries as tens of thousands of banner-waving protesters marched toward the UN conference.

 

Police estimated their numbers at 25,000, while organizers said as many as 100,000 had joined the march from downtown Copenhagen, waving banners that read "Nature doesn't compromise" and "Climate Justice Now."

 

Danish supermodel Helena Christensen was in the crowd. "They will be very bad politicians if they do not hear us by now," she said about the policy-makers negotiating in Copenhagen.

 

Most of the demonstrators were peaceful but police detained some 600 people in a preventive raid against a bloc of youth activists at the back of the procession, police spokesman Rasmus Bernt Skovsgaard said.

 

"There was some cobblestone-throwing and at the same time people were putting on masks," he said. "We decided to go for preventive detentions to give the peaceful demonstration the possibility to move on."

 

There were no reports of injuries.

 

Earlier police said they had detained 19 people, mainly for breaking Denmark's strict laws against carrying pocket knives or wearing masks during demonstrations.

 

Delegates at the conference center gathered around flat-screen TVs to watch live footage showing riot police rounding up small groups of young people dressed in black from the back of the demonstration and tying their hands with plastic wrist restraints.

 

Environmental activists also rallied elsewhere in Europe and in Asia to increase the pressure on climate negotiators in Copenhagen.

 

'Stop the planet's fever'

Thousands marched in a "Walk Against Warming" in major cities across Australia and about 200 Filipino activists staged a festive rally in Manila to mark the Global Day of Action on climate change. Dozens of Indonesian environmental activists rallied in front of the US Embassy in Jakarta.

 

Thousands of environmentalists staged stunts and protests in 100 piazzas across Italy, from Venice's St. Mark's Square to a historical piazza in downtown Rome. They carried banners that read "stop the planet's fever" and asked passers-by to sign a petition calling on world leaders to reach a deal to reduce emissions.

 

Initial reaction to the negotiating text submitted Friday underscored the split between the US-led wealthy countries and countries still struggling to overcome poverty and catch up with the modern world.

 

The tightly focused document was meant to lay out the crunch themes for environment ministers to wrestle with as they prepare for a summit of some 110 heads of state and government at the end of next week.

 

The draft distributed to the 192-nation conference set no firm figures on financing or on cutting greenhouse gas emissions.

 

Turning voluntary pledge into legal commitment

It said all countries together should reduce emissions by a range of 50 percent to 95 percent by 2050, and rich countries should cut emissions by 25 to 40 percent by 2020, in both cases using 1990 as the baseline year.

 

It makes no similar requirements of developing countries like China and India, which have pledged to reduce the growth rate of emissions but reject the notion of turning those voluntary pledges into legal commitments.

 

So far, industrial nations' pledges to cut emissions have amounted to far less than the minimum.

 

European Union leaders announced in Brussels this week after two days of tough talks that they would commit $3.6 billion a year until 2012 to a short-term fund for poor countries. Most of this money came from Britain, France and Germany.

 

Many cash-strapped former East bloc countries balked at donating but eventually all gave at least a token amount to preserve the 27-nation bloc's unity.

 

Still unknown is how much the wealthier nations, such as the US and Japan, will contribute.

 


פרסום ראשון: 12.12.09, 19:37
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