Ms Hedegaard was speaking at the Barcelona Climate Change Talks 2009, the last official negotiations under the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change before the Copenhagen Climate Change Conference in December.

“The world can wait no longer,” Ms Hedegaard told delegates, reasoning that while striking a deal now would not be easy, it would not be easier in the future either.

Delegates from 30 countries from all over the world were in attendance, including China, USA, Brazil, India, South Africa, Japan, numerous European Union member states, and small island states.

“Of course, we will not solve every single detail in Copenhagen, but Copenhagen must deliver a coherent and ambitious immediate answer to the challenge.”

Ms Hedegaard said that she hoped carbon mitigation would be a key focus at Copenhagen: “On mitigation, we still need to get the numbers right. While the gap is no longer abysmal – we are still far from the numbers set by science.”

She also stressed that developed nations would be expected to deliver substantial reductions in relation to developing nations.