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Copenhagen. During the UN climate talks this week, Ahfi Wahyu Hidayat from Yogyakarta, and Abdul Halim from Jakarta, found themselves advocating for something they hadn’t previously given much thought to.

The environmental activists stood among thousands of delegates, negotiators and observers packed into the official venue of the talks, holding up signs for climate justice in Africa.

Wearing green ponchos and holding up “Don’t Kill Kyoto Targets” signs with 28 other young activists from Europe and South America, they received an ovation from those standing nearby.

A small cheer in what has been mostly cheerless talks.

Wet, dark and freezing cold, the weather of Copenhagen this week has suitably matched the mood of climate talks. Despite a temporary boycott by several African leaders, organizational bungling, heavy police monitoring of protests and accusations flying between developing and developed countries, Wahyu says he’ll leave the conference feeling more than just frustration.

“Before, I only thought about Indonesia,” he said. “Now I think about the world. I have so much more information, and I know what’s going on on the other side of the world. It has enriched my mind.”

Wayhu, 24, and Halim, 26, are two of nearly 20 Indonesian activists here to observe the 15th Conference of the Parties (COP15) plenary session for the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, sponsored by donors including Friends of the Earth Germany, who paid for their flights, hostel accommodation and food.

And while leaders from developed and developing nations run meetings into the early hours of the morning without reaching consensus, the Indonesian activists say they have established networks with other young campaigners from all over the world at the alternative “Peoples’ Climate Summit,” known as Klima Forum, also being held in the city.

They see a stark difference between the two conferences. Throngs of diplomats, NGO delegates and journalists wait for hours each morning at the meshed steel entrance to the official climate conference center just to get in. Thousands of observers have since had their accreditations suspended because of overcrowding at the conference center. But at the Klima Forum, a rotating door allows unrestricted access, and participants say they can air issues and ideas muffled in official talks.

“It was just bulls**t,” Wayhu, a Friends of the Earth community organizer in Yogyakarta, said of the discussions he observed at the official conference center. “They say they care about participation from observers, but we are not really participating.”

Wayhu and Halim say climate justice and fairer distribution of natural resources is something that has been starkly missing from the climate talks.

Halim says the conference’s love affair with carbon trading has seen other important issues left by the wayside. Indonesia’s campaigning on climate and oceans — at the World Oceans Conference in Manado earlier this year and at COP15 — have been at the expense of traditional fisherman, who are left without livelihoods as marine parks are created, he says.

“It’s just good on paper, but bad in reality,” said Halim, a coordinator with the People’s Coalition for Equal Fisheries (Kiara). “Traditional fishermen’s rights are not mentioned. [Government officials] just talk about how Indonesia can get more funds to develop marine protected areas.”

Wahyu is skeptical about the Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation in Developing Countries (REDD) draft text, being formulated at COP15 — of key interest to Indonesia, and heralded as a means for developing nations to preserve their forests, and sell the carbon they have saved by doing so as credits to developed countries. Negotiations over the draft text continued late into Tuesday night, and were due to be handed over to heads of state participating in the conference on Wednesday.

“It’s only about how [Indonesia] can make money from REDD,” he said. “It’s not clear enough in recognizing the rights of indigenous people. Another reason it’s awful is that it’s the tool that will allow industrial countries to pollute more carbon dioxide.”

Wahyu has recently published a book on the problems of so called community-based conservation in the recently-declared Merapi National Park in Yogyakarta. “They say they involve people, but it’s not about reducing their poverty. It’s a way for the government to get more money,” he said.

But Fitrian Ardiansyah, WWF-Indonesia’s program director for climate and energy, who has been a key observer to the REDD negotiations at COP15, said the draft text had made good progress in a global agreement to protect forests, and had enshrined indigenous rights in parts of the text, that, if adopted, would be legally-binding.

With deforestation in Indonesia driven by investment in the forestry sector, Fitrian said asking the Indonesian government to change its policy toward forests without finding new forms of investment would be difficult. REDD provided an alternative investment source that was sustainable.

“I’m with an NGO but I’m also realistic,” he said. “I believe this negotiation, albeit imperfect, has provided new options.”