UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon on Monday called the Copenhagan climate summit "a success" and "a significant step forward"in committing countries to respond to global warming.
"I know there are different assessments on the outcome of the conference, the overwhelming number of countries thinks it is a great success, and it takes a significant step forward," he told reporters. "I think we did get what we need" to push forward the process of the global fight against climate change.
The accord issued at the end of the Copenhagen conference was accepted by most
member states, including developing countries, developed nations and small island countries.
"The least developing countries and the land-locked countries also support the accord," he
said.
Ban said in Copenhagen on Saturday that the negotiation process at the climate conference
was by far the most complicated he had known. That was because the countries that were
attending the conference all had different positions and situations, he said.
The conference had agreed, Ban said, to "take note of the Copenhagen Accord," which
was expected by many to be "accepted." His assistant later explained that the words "take
note of" and "accept" were nearly equal in legal terms.
The Copenhagen climate change conference, which was scheduled to end on Dec. 18, was
extended to Dec. 19 because of the disagreement of a number of developing countries,including Bolivia, Cuba, Sudan and Venezuela. Those countries said they could not accept the
Copenhagen Accord draft because it lacked ambitious targets for reducing carbon emissions.
After managing to persuade the parties to "take note of the Copenhagen Accord," Ban urged them to translate it into a legally binding treaty as soon as possible in 2010.
He added that any necessary measures would be taken to facilitate a treaty. Ban's efforts to
seal a deal on Friday made him not eat until Saturday morning and he slept only two hours in
the past two days.
Back at UN Headquarters in New York on Monday, Ban called on world leaders to strive

to reach a legally binding treaty.
"That's really a big challenge for the United Nations and the world leaders," he said. "We should be more practical, and we should be more forthcoming, rather than being critical."