An unprecedented climate summit is still scheduled to take place in Paris, despite Friday's deadly attacks.
Some 40,000-plus journalists, diplomats and climate activists, as well as 127 heads of state including President Obama, Chinese President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin, are expected to attend the Paris talks which begins Nov. 30.
The French government is determined not to let the attacks derail plans for the meeting, which is aimed at producing the first-ever global climate change agreement committing both developing and industrialized countries to reduce emissions of greenhouse gas emissions.
"The COP21 [is] to be held," said French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius on Saturday, speaking from Vienna, where he is participating in talks on Syria, according to Le Monde.
"It will be held with enhanced security measures but it is absolutely essential action against climate change and obviously it will be held," Fabius said.
UN climate secretariat in Bonn has confirmed #COP21 will go ahead as planned, with understandably tighter security.— pilitaclark (@pilitaclark) November 14, 2015
NewsAlert: Mourning #ParisAttacks @UN officially confirms #COP21 ON @LFFriedman Details: https://t.co/suzqh2i2JS pic.twitter.com/hOerj8NmPx— E&E Publishing (@EEPublishing) November 14, 2015
In the wake of the attacks, the French government is reviewing its security plans -- which had already included strict border controls -- to ensure the safety of the diplomatic meeting and its attendees.
A French government source told Reuters that changing the venue of the meeting or canceling the meeting "is in no way under consideration," but that security could be beefed up.
Nick Nuttall, the spokesman for the U.N. Framework Convention on Climate Change, told ClimateWire that the climate talks will be held as scheduled.
"COP21 is going ahead as planned," Nuttall said of the summit. "Security is always tight at U.N. climate conferences, but it is understandable that this year in Paris, it will be even tighter," he said.
Nuttall said that U.N. climate chief Christiana Figueres has spoken with French leaders to express her sympathies and solidarity with the people of Paris.
.@LaurentFabius says #COP21 is essential to combat #climatechange and that it will take place despite #ParisAttacks https://t.co/mHTZR3hQe8— UN Climate Action (@UNFCCC) November 14, 2015
In addition to the diplomatic meeting itself, numerous civil society events, from concerts to marches of climate activists, are slated to take place around the city in the runup to and during this period. Also, international organizations, corporations and local and regional leaders are expected to travel to Paris and showcase their activities to reduce global warming pollutants, with many of those events occurring in the city itself.
While the climate summit site is heavily secured on the outskirts of the city, many of these other events represent the sort of soft targets hit on Friday, and may not have prepared security plans ahead of time.
Le Monde also quoted the secretary general of COP21, Pierre-Henri Guignard as saying that summit officials from the U.N. held a crisis meeting on Saturday morning. "But it is the government that will decide what action to take," he said.
For more than a year, French President Francois Hollande and Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius have traveled around the world to ensure that a robust and durable climate treaty is reached at this meeting, and that Paris does not become associated with diplomatic failure the way Copenhagen did when negotiations broke down, only to be partially salvaged at the last minute, in 2009.
In deep pain. Standing in solidarity with Paris and the whole of France pic.twitter.com/fQ13WieX0w— Christiana Figueres (@CFigueres) November 14, 2015
The attacks have already canceled at least one Climate Summit-related event, when a 24-hour live concert and webcast put on by the Climate Reality Project, which is former Vice President Al Gore's group, had to halt after broadcasting for several hours on Friday. It is unclear whether or when the event may resume.
Out of solidarity with the French people and the City of Paris, we have decided to suspend our broadcast (1/2) #24HoursofReality— Climate Reality (@ClimateReality) November 13, 2015