As the weeks wind down to the start of the COP15 climate summit, Robert Mugabe joins the list of heads of state planning to attend

Zimbabwe’s controversial president Robert Mugabe has confirmed his attendance at the UN Climate Change Conference and is heading for Copenhagen this December.

The Zimbabwean Embassy in Stockholm confirmed to Jyllands-Posten newspaper that the president has accepted Denmark’s official invitation to attend the conference.

‘He intends to participate. I can’t confirm the date of his arrival now, but he is coming,’ said Bebra Gerald Munodawafa, councellor at the embassy.

EU sanctions forbid Mugabe and many of his government officials from travelling to member states. But Mugabe will be allowed into Copenhagen for the climate summit under the diplomatic immunity rules of the UN.

Søren Pind, foreign affairs spokesman for the Liberal Party, said he believed Mugabe’s arrival would be a detrimental to the summit.

‘I don’t understand what Mugabe will do in Denmark. A person like him should be excluded from taking part in such summits, but unfortunately that’s how the UN system is,’ Pind said.