Copenhagen: A summit for Elites?
By Fausto Triana

Despite organizational details, the so much awaited UN Climate Change Conference in December seems to be designed for the elite, with extremely exorbitant prices.

Denmark will host the event, and its capital Copenhagen will welcome the heads of State or government, hoping to solve compelling problems for humanity.

Curiously, when the UN Food and Agriculture Organization will hold another top level conference on world hunger next week in Rome, Copenhagen readies to offer a "lavish" meeting.

For four weeks, I went through a personal experience that if were not available to the media in developing countries, it would be a new professional anecdote. Trying to get a hotel room in the Danish capital was a nightmare.

Despite exhausting attempts on the Internet, it was absolutely impossible to find a room under 220 euros per night (410 US dollars at the current exchange).

The organizing committee of COP 15, as the UN meeting on climate change is known, offers alleged facilities for hotel reservation on its webpage, ranging from cheap to five star hotels.

But it is actually a trick. NHG Danish Firm, acting as intermediary for reservations, offers boring clicking sequences on the cyberspace, to then show the user a segment of reasonable tariffs already taken.

With such momentous UN event, where participation literally involves everyone, the hotel chain of a country is not supposed to be trying to recover in a year of international financial crisis.

Hotels awarded three, four, and five stars are taking prices to exorbitant levels. If not intentional, it seems to be a sort of boycott for delegates and journalists with average resources. Two hotels in Copenhagen that I prefer not to mention show their price lists on the NHG official sites. Then, the unpleasant surprise: a room at 104 euros per night is offered (in this case to me) at 330 euros, while another hotel where a room is regularly at 185 euros daily is now at 390 euros.

In essence, we are talking of over $500 for spending one night in Copenhagen, and COP 15 will be held for 12 days. Thus, we will see an elitist summit, undoubtedly controlled by the media from the western powers.

Taken from Granma International