01 Oct Copenhagen: Obama Better Go Back

October 1st, 2009
By Naomi Klein

When Obama arrives in Copenhagen tomorrow to support Chicago’s Olympic bid, he will be showing the world that he is willing to schlep to Scandinavia for an event he considers important. The big question now is: will he do it again on December 7, when Copenhagen plays host to the United Nations summit on climate change, the highest-stakes environmental negotiations in history?

British Prime Minister Gordon Brown has already pledged to be there, characterizing the summit as a last chance to pull the planet back from the brink. “I will go to Copenhagen to conclude the deal,” Brown told the UN General Assembly. “This is too important an agreement—for the global economy, and for the future of every nation represented here—to leave to our official negotiators. So I urge my fellow leaders to commit themselves to going to Copenhagen too.”