The United States formally withdraws from the Paris Agreement against climate change

The United States has formally abandoned the Paris Agreement against climate change on Wednesday, a year after notifying the United Nations, in full uncertainty over the results of the presidential elections, with the race still open between the current president, Donald Trump, and his Democratic rival, Joe Biden.

In 2017, the Trump Administration announced that it intended to withdraw the United States from the agreement as soon as legally possible on the grounds that it imposed an unbearable economic burden on its country. Trump has repeatedly mocked this pact, which sets national goals for reducing greenhouse gas emissions.

However, the US Government has had to meet the deadlines contemplated by the pact itself, signed in 2015 by the Executive of Barack Obama. Article 28 of the Paris Agreement stipulates that a member state may withdraw from 4 November 2020, provided that its government sends a formal notification to the UN one year before that date.

Washington complied with this procedure on November 4, 2019, which has made the United States the first country to stand out from the almost 200 signatories of the agreement on Wednesday. Biden has already promised that, if he gets to the White House, he will reverse Trump’s decision.

Source: Europe Press