Photo: Keld Navntoft/Scanpix

“A deal is within our reach,” the Danish Prime Minister said on Monday – the first day of the UN climate change conference.

The UN climate change conference opened Monday in an atmosphere of hope for a deal in Copenhagen within the next two weeks.

“A deal is within our reach,” the Danish Prime Minister Lars Løkke Rasmussen said in his opening speech, stressing that the talks will have to overcome deep distrust between rich and poor nations on how to share the burden of curbing emissions.

The presence of more than a hundred world leaders meant “an opportunity the world cannot afford to miss,” Lars Løkke Rasmussen said.

At a press briefing, the President of the UN climate change conference, Connie Hedegaard, said that “the deadline is working,” referring to the fact that both developed and developing countries had been presenting emission reduction targets ahead of the conference.

Asked if there is enough time to reach a deal in Copenhagen, Connie Hedegaard said that you never feel you have sufficient time for a task that has to be done, but “within the time we have, we must solve the task”.

Besides commitments to cut emissions, a major aspect of the negotiations is financing of mitigation and adaptation to climate change in developing countries. At the press briefing UN’s top climate negotiator Yvo de Boer said that the talks are about the amount of money needed from the developed countries.Yet another important issue is “how do we allocate the still limited resources,” according to him.

On the 17th and 18th of December, 110 heads of states and governments will come to Copenhagen in an attempt to seal a political global climate deal. If a deal is agreed, the UN will aim at transforming it into a legally binding text to replace the Kyoto Protocol as its regulations of emissions expires in 2012