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UN Secretary-General António Guterres warns countries have withdrawn from the promise made nearly three years ago to save the planet from the most catastrophic effects of climate change, Monday reprimanded world leaders on the reduction greenhouse gas emissions.
"Climate change is the defining issue of our time and we are at a decisive moment," he told UN headquarters in New York. "Scientists have been telling us for decades. Again and again. Too many leaders have refused to listen.
"If we do not change course by 2020, we risk missing the point where we can avoid uncontrollable climate change," Guterres said.
His remarks were made with countries around the world who were far from achieving the goals they had set in the 2015 Paris agreement to reduce emissions that have warmed the planet during of the last century. The next round of climate negotiations is scheduled for this year in Poland.
One of the major tests of these negotiations, starting on 3 December in Katowice, will be whether countries, particularly the industrialized countries that produce a large part of global emissions, will set higher targets for reducing their emissions.
"The time has come for our leaders to show that they care about the people whose fate they have in their hands," Guterres said. without answering journalists' questions. "We need to move quickly away from our dependence on fossil fuels."
Guterres' speech came a few days before a high-level meeting on climate change in San Francisco, led by California Governor Jerry Brown, to demonstrate what businesses and local leaders have done to fight against climate change.
The UN chief seems to be taking a page from Mr. Brown's game book. He, too, looks beyond national leaders to make a difference. He invited industry and municipal leaders to his climate change forum in September 2019, in an apparent effort to increase pressure on national governments.
The Paris Agreement aims to maintain the temperatures more than 2 degrees Celsius preindustrial levels to avoid what scientists call the most catastrophic impacts of climate change.
But few countries are even close to achieving the goals they placed under the pact of Paris. And a UN assessment has shown that national targets to date only reach one-third of the global target.
Mr. Guterres has sought to demonstrate that the abandonment of fossil fuels such as oil and coal would create jobs and strengthen economies. Rebuthing critics who claim that such a change would be costly, he termed this idea "hogwash".
He cited the steps taken by private companies to get rid of polluting fossil fuels – including the insurance company Allianz, which promised to stop insuring coal-fired plants – although these actions are clearly insufficient.
"These are all important advances," Guterres said. "But they are not enough. The transition to a cleaner, greener future needs to accelerate. "
He warned against a "backtracking of the government" on the Paris Agreement and urged world leaders to mobilize.
"What we still miss, even after the Paris deal, is the leadership and ambition to do what's right," he said.
Mr. Guterres did not mention any country or head of state. But the leader of the most powerful country in the world was threatened: President Trump, who rejected climate science, overturned environmental regulations and promised to pull the United States out of the Paris climate deal.
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