Massive protest held at Copenhagen climate conference

COPENHAGEN — Tens of thousands of protesters took to the streets of Copenhagen on Saturday to demand a strong global-climate pact, even as world leaders reiterated that the coming week’s talks will not lead to a binding legal agreement.

Among the balloons and climate-themed sails waved during the massive demonstration flew the flags of left-of-centre European political parties, as well as signs reading "there is no planet B."

While most of the march was peaceful, riot police detained between 600 and 800 people around the Danish capital after some black-clad demonstrators threw bottles and smashed windows.

"And the number is growing," police spokesman Flemming Steen Munch said.

The marchers spread out across six kilometres as they walked toward Copenhagen’s Bella Centre, the high-security site of the international talks.

Estimates ranged from 30,000 upwards to 100,000 protesters, all of whom flocked to the Danish capital from across Europe and the world.

"They marched in Berlin, and the wall fell. They marched in Cape Town, and the wall fell," South African cleric and Nobel Peace Prize winner Archbishop Desmond Tutu told a candlelit vigil of protesters. "They marched in Copenhagen — and we are going to get a real deal."

Supermodel Helena Christensen gave a speech in which she described a trip to her mother’s home country of Peru. There, she said farmers, alpaca herdsmen and their families are already suffering the effects of climate change. Melting glaciers are threatening their water supplies and ability to grow food.

"Whether you are a skeptic or an activist on this front, I believe there’s one underlying truth that we need to acknowledge: we must collectively take more responsibility for the well-being of our planet, and of each other," said Christensen, who is half-Danish.

At the tail end of the procession, police separated several hundred protesters from the main group and carried out a number of arrests.

"The police had just come in and sliced off a section of the march," said Australian activist Nicola Bullard, 51.

"Anybody could have been there."

TV images showed the handcuffed protesters sitting on the ground, ordered in long lines along Amagerbrogade, one of the city’s major shopping streets.

The Copenhagen march was the centrepiece to demonstrations that took place around the world.

Australia, the developed world’s worst per-capita polluter, saw as many as 50,000 people taking to the streets nationwide, according to organizers.

In Indonesia, the third-biggest emitter of greenhouse gases after China and the United States, activists rallied outside the U.S. embassy in Jakarta to urge the country to support developing nations in reducing emissions.

In the Philippines, hundreds of protesters wearing red shirts banged on drums and sang songs outside Manila’s City Hall demanding global action on climate change.

Although the protesters were marching for quick action to prevent what they say will be catastrophic climate change, the United Nations talks are still stuck on a number of major issues.

They include the type of legal framework for the agreement, the toughness of targets for developed countries, adaptation funding for poorer countries, and whether or not there should be hard caps on emissions on developing countries such as China.

After meeting with protesters, UN climate chief Yvo de Boer said countries are likely to come out of Copenhagen with a set of decisions that launch immediate action on adaptation, preserving forests, industrialized emission targets and financial support for developing countries. For that, they should be proud, he said.

“Given the state of play, and given the amount of remaining time, we cannot cast that all in a legal binding agreement here in Copenhagen," de Boer said.

"We do need to do that within the next six or 12 months in 2010 to really capitalize on what comes out of Copenhagen and turn it into strong legal text."

A draft of an agreement released Friday said developed nations should cut their emissions on average by at least 25 to 40 per cent, ranging up to about 45 per cent by 2020, also from 1990 levels. That is significantly tougher than Canada’s current proposal of cutting emissions from 2006 levels by 20 per cent over the next decade.

Both Canadian chief negotiator Michael Martin and federal Environment Minister Jim Prentice have said they can work from the text, but have serious concerns. Martin has said for the agreement to be fair, major but developing countries — such as China or India — need to have legally binding commitments open to scrutiny just as developed nations do.

"Clearly the text requires some work, but we continue to be optimistic," Prentice said during a brief news conference Saturday evening. Prentice will spend the entire weekend meeting with his global counterparts.

For delegates at the conference, there is hope that the arrival of environment ministers and heads of state this weekend and early next week will bring about a successful conclusion.

"Never have you had this civil society pressure. Never have you had world leaders coming in for a decision-making meeting like this," said Alden Meyer, director of strategy and policy for the Union of Concerned Scientists.