MOSCOW (Pakistan Point News / Sputnik - 22nd January, 2020) Former Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull has slammed Donald Trump for denying the ongoing impact of climate change, after the US president used a speech at the World Economic Forum in the Swiss resort of Davos to criticize climate change activists.
"He uses the politics of fear when it suits him, and essentially Trump is the leading climate denier in the world. He's leading the most influential nation in the world and is actively working against global action to reduce emissions," Turnbull, who served as Australia's prime minister from 2015 to 2018, said during an appearance on the BBC's Newsnight program on Tuesday evening.
Earlier in the day, Trump stated that the US has some of the world's cleanest air and drinking water, and that the country would join the One Trillion Trees Initiative, launched at the Davos summit. However, the president fired a parting shot at climate change activists.
"This is not a time for pessimism. This is a time for optimism. Fear and doubt is not a good thought process because this a time for tremendous hope and joy and optimism and action. But to embrace the possibilities of tomorrow we must reject the perennial prophets of doom and their predictions of the apocalypse," the president said, while calling climate change activists "radical socialists."
Trump also said on Tuesday that he knew nothing of prominent climate change activist Greta Thunberg.
The 50th Annual World Economic Forum, held in Davos, will run until Friday.
