Statements by the European Union and China trailed ahead of Paris Climate Deal meetings this week suggest the two powers intend to push ahead with the potentially damaging pact, despite the apparent withdrawal of the U.S.
Draft leaders’ statements seen by Politico ahead of the summit, due to take place Thursday and Friday, suggest China and the EU are to deepen cooperation without the U.S., amidst widespread reports that President Donald Trump is to pull his nation out of the 2015 accord.
The legally binding 2017 deal signing would enhance the requirements upon global nations, forcing signatories to limit human economic activity, and rich countries to provide “climate finance” to poor nations, paying for their renewable energy projects. This climate finance fund is expected to cost some $100 billion a year.
According to the draft statement: “The EU and China consider climate action and the clean energy transition an imperative… Stepping up action will provide both sides with significant opportunities.”
The comments came as German leader Chancellor Angela Merkel said Europe could no longer “count on others”.
Speaking in May, British member of the European Parliament Janice Atkinson attacked the Paris deal as creating stealth taxes, and praised President Trump for potentially taking the United States out of the agreement, as it would encourage others.
She said: “MEPs from a number of parties came together to show our support for President Trump in his bid to shut down the climate change industry. It is an industry that has profited for too many years from the poor and one that has become very rich indeed by playing upon people’s fears and shutting down their opposition.
“Taxes, dressed up in green, have been a burden on industry in general, on pensioners and on the poor who have had to pay for politicians’ blind acceptance of bad science and lobby interests.
“If Trump acts, others may too.”
Britain’s Financial Times reports the EU and China intend to accelerate the “irreversible” move from fossil fuels and that the two climate change partners are “determined to forge ahead” with transforming the global economy.
Wednesday’s tweet from President Trump triggering the speculation over the U.S.’s withdrawal from the Paris Climate agreement comes after a campaign promise to “cancel” the deal, and a considerable number of comments over what he has called the climate change “hoax”.
Speaking in 2016, President Trump said of the Paris deal signed in 2015 that it was signed by former President Barack Obama “unilaterally and without the permission of Congress”.
“This agreement gives foreign bureaucrats control over how much energy we use right here in America,” he said.
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