The U.S. and China together produce 38 percent of the world’s man-made carbon dioxide emissions.
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Earlier today, China’s parliament ratified the agreement, with President Xi saying his country was “solemnly” committed to the deal. To be exact, at least 55 countries representing at least 55 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions need to give their final ratification or acceptance for it to enter into force.
“This is not a fight that any one country, no matter how powerful, can take alone”, Obama said of the pact.
It sets a target to hold the global average rise in temperature below 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels, and preferably below 1.5 degrees.
“We understand that President Barack Obama will announce the United States will also ratify the deal”.
“Part of what I’ve tried to communicate to President Xi is that the United States arrives at its power, in part, by restraining itself”, Obama said.
Sources, who spoke on condition of anonymity due to restriction on speaking to the media, said Xi also expressed his solidarity with the Turkish government during talks ahead of the G20 summit in eastern China. Fewer than half of the requisite 55 countries will have joined, but many others have signaled they plan to join in 2016, and the White House has been hopeful the deal can take force before year’s end.
The G-20 summit of industrialized and emerging-market nations kicks off Sunday in the southern Chinese city of Hangzhou, China.
Alden Meyer, worldwide director of the Union of Concerned Scientists, said the Paris agreement’s detailed rules will likely take another year or two to finalize.
In a speech Saturday, Mr. Xi pledged to cut carbon dioxide emissions per unit of GDP by 18 per cent in the next five years.
“Laos believes that with the efforts of the Chinese government and people as well as cooperation of participants, the G20 summit will achieve the expected results”, he told the Chinese reporters.
US Democratic presidential candidate Hillary Clinton is a strong supporter of the accord, but her Republican counterpart Donald Trump has dismissed man-made climate change as a hoax and says he will abandon the Paris agreement if elected.
Mrs May will call for the global community to work together to support other countries in the region “to prevent IS taking a foothold there”.
Li Shuo, senior climate policy adviser for the environmental group Greenpeace, said Saturday that the two countries acting on the agreement was “a very important next step”.
Obama credited USA and China leadership as a major reason for the agreement in Paris, and said he plans to continue deepening the US relationship with China even after he leaves office. That won’t happen until a critical mass of polluting countries joins.
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The letter commended the “vital leadership” shown by the group in adopting the landmark Paris agreement, signed last December at the annual climate conference COP21.
