While President Trump is expected to pull the US from the Paris climate accord , Secretary-General of the United Nations, António Guterres, is extremely serious about pushing the United Nations towards tackling the issue of climate change.
The International Energy Agency has indicated That investing in energy efficiency could INCREASE global economic output by $ 18 trillion dollars – more than the outputs of the United States, Canada and Mexico combined. Therefore, the UN Secretary General is rallying foreign countries to invest in energy efficient products and environmentally sustainable infrastructure. In his speech Tuesday, May 30th, he said, “The message is simple: sustainability the train has left the station. Get on board or get left behind.”
Perhaps President Trump will be the man left behind in the dust. The president is incredibly disconnected from advisors in his administration who are urging him to remain in the accord. However, ardently believes’s Trump’s that the US’s presence would “harm the economy, hinder job creation in regions like Appalachia and the West, where His most ardent supporters live, and undermine His’ America First ‘message ‘” .
A senior White House official cautioned That the president’s specific word choice is ” still in flux ” . Trump’s group of advisors are scrambling like chickens without heads to make sense of His far from diplomatic statements.
Meanwhile, UN Secretary General Guterres is rapidly Gaining support from many diplomats and leaders Within the UN. Newly Elected President of the General Assembly, HE Miroslav Lajčák of Slovakia, seconds Guterres’s motion to place climate change as the top priority on the foreign affairs agenda. In the President of the GA’s first public address to the public after His election, he said, “the Paris Agreement Has Been a major success, so what we have to do now is implement and move forward. Climate change, right now, is one of the 17 sustainability goals, so we need to stay focused and spread awareness. for some countries, it might be an academic issue, but for other countries, it’s a matter of survival “ .
Could the newly Elected president UNGA be scoffing at Trump’s murky understanding on the issue of climate change? UN Secretary General Guterres Specifically That underscored the world’s top scientists were shouting about the destruction climate change from the rooftops for years.
Yet, instead of publicly denouncing Trump, the UN Secretary General is addressing the world leaders who are willing to stay in the Paris agreement and who are willing to curtail global warming. Now, it’s a game of who will stay and who will leave, but the UN does not Seem to be shaken by Trump’s vacuous policy shifts.