Port of Spain: More than 85 heads of state are to attend climate talks in Copenhagen December 7-18, giving the meeting major summit status, according to Danish Prime Minister Lars Loekke Rasmussen.
"A strong deal -- sealed at the leaders’ level – will serve as a clear and detailed guidance for negotiators to quickly finalise a legal framework. The stronger the deal, the faster we reach our end goal," Rasmussen said in a speech to a gathering of Commonwealth leaders underway in Trinidad.
The Danish Prime Minister`s country is outside the Commonwealth but he was invited to Trinidad along with UN chief Ban Ki-moon and French President Nicolas Sarkozy in a sign of the importance of the looming Copenhagen summit.
Rasmussen said invitations went out to heads of state and government two weeks ago and "the response so far has been overwhelmingly positive”.
An official in his office specified that, as of yesterday, 87 leaders had accepted.
Among those who have publicly said they are going are US President Barack Obama, British Prime Minister Gordon Brown, France`s Sarkozy, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva, Japanese Prime Minister Yukio Hatoyama, Indonesian President Susilo Bambang and Australian Prime Minister Kevin Rudd.
PTI
