Former UN Chief Ban Ki-moon Says All Countries Needed On Board To Fight Climate Change

Former UN Chief Ban Ki-moon Says All Countries Needed on Board to Fight Climate Change

Former UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said Tuesday that climate change is approaching fast and all countries are needed to jointly fight it

ABU DHABI (UrduPoint News / Sputnik - 15th January, 2019) Former UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon said Tuesday that climate change is approaching fast and all countries are needed to jointly fight it.

"Not a single country or individual or a group of countries can do it alone. Our challenges are enormous: the climate change is happening and approaching much, much faster if you look at the pattern of events that happened recently. Each and every one of us are in this together. We should be ready to mobilize our whole resources and our wisdom. This is my very urging message to political leaders, business and civil society leaders," Ban said at the Future Sustainability Summit in Abu Dhabi.

He also addressed the youth to act toward ensuring succession in politics "in a sustainable way."

"Young people who are here, you should also challenge political leaders, just make sure the leaders should be banished in a sustainable way for a succeeding generation.

Unless we work together, I don't think we can do it," he added.

The dangers of climate change became more pronounced a year ago after US President Donald Trump 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.