Donald Trump Plans to Withdraw from Paris Climate Deal

Rabat – According a White House source, US President Donald Trump plans to pull out of the Paris climate accord.

To formalize the withdrawal, the Trump administration has two options. The small team deciding the fate of US climate policy could either initiate a full, formal withdrawal, a process that could take three years, or they could leave the United Nations climate change treaty, a move that would be faster and more drastic according to a report by Axios.

The decision to withdraw from the Paris accords comes after world leaders pressed Trump on the issue during his first trip abroad. Even Pope Francis, who met with Trump at the Vatican, urged the president to take climate change seriously and gave him a copy of his papal encyclical on climate change.

For those who followed his campaign, the decision of the administration to pull out from the accord is not surprising. During his campaign, Trump repeatedly told supporters that he would “cancel” the climate accord. This commitment was reinforced by a letter calling for an exit from the accords that was signed by 22 Republican Senators.

The move will likely infuriate America’s allies and undermine global efforts to combat climate change. It could also weaken the commitments of other countries including China and India who, in addition to the United States, are some of the largest producers of carbon dioxide. Scientists have warned that without urgent action, climate change will have catastrophic effects in the near future.

The 2015 accord was originally agreed to by 200 countries in Paris. The goal of the accord was to limit global warming by reducing emissions and by cutting down on the burning of fossil fuels. The only other two countries that do not support the deal are Nicaragua and Syria.

This is not the first time that the United States went back on a previously signed climate pact. Former president George W. Bush abandoned the 1997 Kyoto accord that had been negotiated by the Clinton administration. That decision produced years of distrust about the commitment of the United States to combating climate change.