Wednesday, January 13, 2010

Nations divided, citizens united


By Bhaskar Goswami
Copenhagen, 13 Dec 2009


Citizens from developed and developing countries marched together
(photo: Bhaskar Goswami)

While negotiators fail to reach consensus on a binding climate agreement; citizens from the entire world took part in a peaceful protest march in Copenhagen bringing the city to a standstill.

Being the usual venue for an international conference, Bella Centre has very little to offer apart from overpriced food, scandalously expensive coffee (it tastes heavenly, though!), and hardly any space to space out… the venue is simply overcrowded. Many of the usual elements of such venues certainly exist - eternal search for a good alfresco coffee bar to catch the latest rumour, windowless conference rooms and long-winded speeches.

December 12 therefore offered a wonderful opportunity to step out and be a part of history on a sunny morning. What was planned to be a march of 50-60,000 protesters soon turned out to be 100,000 strong! Such numbers are daunting even for a city like New Delhi where protests are a regular norm. In Copenhagen, it virtually brought things down to a grinding halt on the 6 km route to Bella Centre.

Violence was feared but was somewhat overestimated going by the sheer number of law enforcers on the street. Not only did they pick up anarchists who were on a violent spree (albeit on a minor scale than what was feared), protesters with their faces covered were also detained as Danish laws prohibit demonstration with faces covered!

On the whole, however, the police were remarkably restrained despite stray provocation by few protestors who were beaming bright laser at overhead choppers (an absolute no as it can cause temporary blindness to the pilots). The protest brought the famed Metro rail service to a grinding halt, not by design but by default; the sheer numbers who wished to travel back to town simply overwhelmed the transport system.

Accompanying photographs tell the remarkable story when citizens from all parts of the world - developed and developing - marched together in a disciplined manner demanding climate justice.

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