China's President Xi and Obama discuss climate change by phone

Countries will maintain cooperation on climate change, the two leaderships said during a phone call

BEIJING: China's President Xi Jinping and US President Barack Obama said during a phone call on Friday that their countries would maintain cooperation on climate change, Chinese state television reported.

Both presidents said they would work closely to advance the success of the Paris climate conference, CCTV said.



Negotiators from 195 countries are trying to agree an accord at the Paris summit to slow climate change by steering the global economy away from its ever-growing reliance on fossil fuels.

The Paris Conference of Parties (COP21) is tasked with producing the first-ever deal committing all the world’s nations to climate action starting in 2020.

About 160 countries have already filed voluntary carbon-curbing pledges to underpin the future pact, but scientists say the aggregate effect falls far short, and Earth is on course for warming of about 3 C, or more.



Scientists say 2 C is the threshold beyond which humankind will struggle to adapt to massive crop failures, water shortages, killer storms, disease spread and wars over dwindling resources.