A story that began in Copenhagen continues in Paris

O n the evening of 18 December 2009, Barack Obama and a trail of White House and State Department officials swept through a cavernous exhibition centre in Copenhagen and barged, uninvited, into a private meeting between the leaders of four powerful developing countries – China, India, Brazil and South Africa. US President, Barack Obama. It was about 6pm on the final day of the Copenhagen climate summit, when nearly 200 countries were expected to agree on collective action to fight climate change. For the first time, the United Nations claimed, countries were on the verge of reducing the greenhouse gas emissions. Obama, along with dozens of other presidents and prime ministers, had flown into Copenhagen for the final day of the summit at the request of the UN secretary general, Ban Ki-Moon, who believed their presence would embolden negotiators to make a deal. The UN was so optimistic about the prospects at the start of that year that it signed off on an ad campaign touting “Hopenhagen”. But by the time Obama gate-crashed the meeting of developing nation leaders, the sun had long set on the Bella Centre exhibition hall, and on any chances of a deal. Hopenhagen lay buried under two weeks of mistrust, rancour, sleep deprivation and unspeakable catering. As the US president saw it, the only chance to avoid a complete collapse of the summit was to try to come to an understanding with China – foremost, along with the US, of the world’s biggest polluters, and holding fast to its industrial progress. Read Suzanne Goldenberg’s story in The Guardian - “Paris climate summit: the climate circus comes to town.”