A fly-on-the-wall look at Pakistan’s disappointing start at COP21
After months of tedious preparation, I finally landed in Paris this past weekend to attend the UN Climate Change Conference 2015 (or COP21 since this is the 21st meeting of the Conference of the Parties).
The night before the conference was scheduled to start; Paris bore a deserted and somewhat desolate look. People in the city are still in mourning after the terrorist attacks that hit the city two weeks ago.
I walked to the River Seine from my hotel near the Notre Dame Cathedral — usually a popular tourist attraction. Instead of throngs of tourists descending from large coasters, I found sombre-looking Parisians lining up to enter the Cathedral for an evening sermon that paid tribute to the citizens killed by the terrorists.
The city is still under a state of emergency and with more than 150 heads of states expected for the opening ceremony of COP21 the next day, the security was tight.
Around 2,000 policemen were patrolling the streets of Paris and with many roads blocked, I guess most people decided to stay home this particular Sunday night. It was sad to see the normally bustling city of lights looking so empty and forlorn.
Also read: Climate change to force 100m more to extreme poverty: WB
The COP21 is to be a decisive summit where countries are expected to agree to a new global deal to tackle climate change.
Scientists say that if we cannot restrict global warming to 2 degrees Celsius, the world will face 'catastrophic' climate change — we are already almost half way there as the world has warmed 0.85 degrees Celsius.
Some experts are calling this conference, “the last chance for humanity” and media from all across the world has flown in to Paris to cover this important negotiation.
The next day there was a buzz of positive energy emanating from the Le Bourget — the venue of the conference in the north of the city. Trains leaving for the centre were packed with delegates from around the world.
An expected 40,000 delegates (from NGOs, media houses, businesses and government-led delegations from 190 countries) were expected to attend the conference.
The roads were blocked for VIP movements as heads of states moved to the conference centre rather early in the morning to be received by the French Prime Minister, Francois Hollande.
I thought I had managed to arrive early, but the queues for registration were already quite long.