It’s been hard to blog about anything concrete these past few days, there’s been so much going on (you can check out all the stunts in the photo or video section) that my mind is still spinning around, even though I’ve been sitting for the past hour… Negotiations change within seconds, as a South African delegate put it, ‘I’d rather not say anything to you, because the knowledge I hold now, could be changing as we speak.’ And he couldn’t be more right…

At 12:45 in the Bella Centre we staged a flashmob ‘Stand With Africa’ because developed countries and certain media agencies were framing Africa as the ‘baddie’ who was ‘deadlocking’ negotiations. But the reality was that developing countries refused to carry on with negotiations after Japan, Australia and other rich countries argued for a new single treaty, a new treaty that developing countries feared would not place strict and legally binding commitments on the developed countries to cut their emissions, unlike the Kyoto protocol.
 

An hour later, after I had munched my lunch, I heard that meetings between Connie Hedegaard, the Danish climate minister, the G77 (coalition of developing countries) and other countries, had resulted in an agreement to continue the talks on two tracks.

So, developing nations won this round, but as heads of state make their way to the Bella Centre this week, the pressure mounts, and mounts, and mounts… Developing leaders have hinted that they will refuse to take part in the final summit unless significant progress is made in the next three days, because they feel that rich countries are up to their usual dirty habits: finalising huge parts of the deal when heads of state arrive on the last day, and then slipping in provisions that will not benefit developing countries, but of course will benefit their own pockets.

It’s easy to lose hope during this last week of chaos and pressure, and so easy for the media to focus on riots, scandal and name-calling rather than focusing on the need for climate justice and keeping their ‘third eye’ on the negotiations. To be honest, even my fighting spirit has seriously been waning, for the rest of the week we will not have access to the Bella Centre as all NGO’s numbers have been cut to less than half, cutting out civil society’s voice… but after Desmond Tutu spoke on Sunday (when he handed over half a million climate justice pledges to Yvo de Boer), and asked the crowd: ‘Do you believe you’re in the winning team?’ And asked us again, and again until he was happy with a loud enough and resounding ‘Yes!’ I realised that giving up faith wasn’t even an option. Without belief that climate justice will become a reality, we have no battle. And this battle isn’t an option, it’s a must. 
  
In the words of Lumumba Di-Aping, Sudanese chief negotiator of the G77, “It is better to stand and cry than to walk away.”

Images: Guardian