Due to the skeptical position of the US administration on climate change, a discussion on climate security has been regrettably blocked at the NATO level, Neil Wood, a member of the European Union Military Staff said during an EU side event at the international climate conference on Thursday.
KATOWICE (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 13th December, 2018) Due to the skeptical position of the US administration on climate change, a discussion on climate security has been regrettably blocked at the NATO level, Neil Wood, a member of the European Union Military Staff said during an EU side event at the international climate conference on Thursday.
"It would be great if there was a conversation going on in NATO headquarters in Brussels about climate security and the importance that NATO holds in addressing the climate security aspects. Unfortunately, because of the current US administration, that is really blocked as a topic for discussion at NATO headquarters at the moment, which is a great shame because the market leaders within the military community is the US DOD [Department of Defense]," Wood said.
The 24th Conference of the Parties to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (COP24) is taking place on December 2-14 in the Polish city of Katowice. The main goal of the conference participants is to discuss ways of implementing the 2015 Paris Agreement on climate change.
The dangers of climate change became more pronounced a year ago after US President Donald Trump has announced that the United States, one of the countries producing the largest amount of carbon emissions in the world, would be withdrawing from the Paris Agreement on climate change. Washington formally notified the United Nations of its intention on August 4, 2017. However, the country cannot officially exit the accord until November 4, 2020.
The Paris climate deal, created within the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, went into force on November 4, 2016. It has been ratified by 184 of the 197 parties to the accord. The deal aims at keeping the increase in average global temperature at below 2 degrees Celsius (3.6 degrees Fahrenheit) above pre-industrial levels by means of reducing greenhouse gas emissions.
