In a move honouring his campaign promise, US President Donald Trump on Thursday announced that the United States will withdraw from the Paris climate agreement.
“I promised I would exit or renegotiate any deal which fails to serve America’s interests,” the president declared in an address in the White House Rose Garden watched anxiously by leaders around the world.
“I was elected to represent the citizens of Pittsburgh, not Paris,” he said.
“As of today, the United States will cease all implementation of the non-binding Paris accord and the draconian financial and economic burdens the agreement imposes on our country,” Trump said.
He complained that the agreement signed under the former President Barack Obama, gives other countries an unfair advantage over US industry and destroys American jobs.
“I cannot, in good conscience, support a deal that punishes the United States — the world’s leader in environmental protection — while imposing no meaningful obligations on the world’s leading polluters,” Trump said.
“This agreement is less about the climate and more about other countries gaining a financial advantage over the United States,” he claimed.
So we’re getting out but we’ll start to negotiate and we will see if we can make a deal that’s fair. And if we can, that’s great. And if we can’t, that’s fine,” he said.
The US would join Syria and Nicaragua as the world’s only non-participants in the climate deal. His decision sparked indignation both in the US and abroad. Obama said that the move meant that the US was “joining a handful of nations that reject the future.” Obama said that the move meant that the US was “joining a handful of nations that reject the future.”
