Donald Trump initiates the withdrawal of the United States from the Paris agreement, for the second time

The element of surprise may be absent, but the announcement nonetheless constitutes a test for climate action. On the first day of his return to power, Monday January 20, Donald Trump signed a decree and a letter to the United Nations planning to once again withdraw the United States from the Paris climate agreement.

The American president, a climate skeptic who describes global warming as ” prank “turns its back on the rest of the world for the second time in the fight against the climate crisis, despite the multiplication of its impacts, like the fires ravaging Los Angeles. The Republican had already withdrawn the United States from the international treaty during his first term, before the Democrat Joe Biden recorded their return in 2021. The new withdrawal is, however, not yet effective: it will only take place in a year, according to the procedural rules of the multilateral text sealed in 2015.

This departure, if it cannot stop an ecological transition that has become essential, should compromise the country's climate objectives but also slow down the global fight against global warming. The United States is in fact the second largest emitter of greenhouse gases in the world, behind China, the largest historical polluter and the largest producer of oil.

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