Meeting the ministers

Today! A meeting with the Dutch Minister of Environment, Cramer and Development Cooperation, Koenders. Four of us could attend the meeting and also the two Dutch youth delegates, Don and Michaela were there. Unfortunately the people from the Dutch Youth Copenhagen Coalition were still in line waiting for their accreditation. They stood in the cold for hours and so did the last three members of PSNL: Merit, Nicolein and Liset.

It is crazy around here. Way too many people are accreditated and there will be some major cuts in people that are allowed to enter the building. For tomorrow and Wednesday, we need secondary badges, which most of us have, fortunately!

But there are so many people who arrived only this weekend and aren't allowed to go inside! Poorly organised, I say. Thursday only 1000 people from NGOs have access and Friday only 90! So that will be a no-go for us, I suppose. Also our youth delegates from Africa have troubles keeping there accreditation as have the 50 Global South youth delegates from the other UNFCCC youth project.... But minister Cramer ensured us that she would do here best to arrange accreditation for these people who came from so far away and would be literally standing in the cold when they couldn't go in.

On the meeting with the ministers: they are really supportive and agree that youth participation should be encouraged and that underrepresentation of developing nations should be addressed on more occasions than only this COP15. As I heard from Matildah, so many decisions already have been made in earlier meetings through out the year and before! This is not a one-time issue Project Survival is touching upon. In my opinion a fair deal is not even possible with this kind of history. The whole circus here is based on quicksand, or at least not a good fundament.

So, do we want a deal now? Do we want reductions for developed countries to be 40%, do we want more than 200 billion for adaptation and mitigation? Do I even know what I'm talking about? I don't think so. I don't even have time read more on these subjects, let alone keep up with the news here in Copenhagen!

But what I do understand that the future is in the hands of people that have Ideas about Other People. Ideas about Their Rights and Others Mistakes. Is there anybody who will defend other needs than their own? I don't feel Dutch, I feel like a World inhabitant. And I think many of the youth here feel this way. If it was up to us we would already have a deal by now.

And all the 'old' people are telling us how they are tied to all this diplomacy and buraucracy, how we, the young people, can make a difference by saying stuff they can only think. They're wrong! They were also young once, they had also ideals once! They still do. And I believe that if everybody just reminds him or herself why they came here in the first place, how they became involved in the government and climate change issues, they'll know we all want the same thing! And hopefully our youth delegates can contribute to this process of going back to the core issues and stop thinking in numbers and percentages.

And if those values have to be translated in numbers and percentages, fine! But what I plea for is a mentality change, a step in the direction of unity. There is only one world, there is no Planet B!

Suzanne dlF