COP17 Durban
Monday, January 9, 2012 at 11:58AM
2011 ended rather stressfully, with me covering the international climate change summit COP17 in Durban, South Africa, in December. Not only did the conference end up being one of the longest global summits in history - initially scheduled for 12 days it went almost 2 full days over time! I also faced the added difficult task of having to report complex scientific and political issues in both German and English, under severe deadline pressures. One 14-hour workday followed the next, and the occasions when I was able to leave the conference centre before dark were rare.
But it was an exciting 2 weeks nonetheless, sometimes even fun. I had the pleasure of briefly meeting United Nations secretary-general Ban Ki-moon (see pic), reconnected with many (new and old) journalist colleagues and networked with a number of interesting people from the politicial, scientific and NGO sectors. Still, I must admit I'm glad there's only one climate summit each year (and I only have to cover those on African soil)!




















