Pakistan has been consistently listed as in the top ten nations that are already severely affected by climate change, and therefore has a close interest in developments regarding this global concern. The announcement by President Donald Trump that he would be taking America out of the 2015 agreement on fighting climate change is therefore of note. Compared to the US the carbon footprint of Pakistan is minuscule and we suffer disproportionately. With the second-largest carbon emitter in the world (China is the biggest) now saying that it is pulling out of the Paris Agreement the architecture of one of the most important accords the world has ever crafted is altered — but not just yet.
As with the British vote to leave the European Union not being a simple ‘on-off’ procedure, so a pull-out from the Paris agreement is also hedged with caveats; and the US has indicated that it will adhere to UN protocols which require a nation to wait for three years from the date on which the pact gained legal force — November 4th 2016 — before seeking to leave formally and then waiting another year after that. The Trump withdrawal is not going to happen tomorrow, and depending on a range of factors, including his own re-election, may not happen at all.
The announcement had been heavily trailed during the recent Trump tour and comes as no surprise, but it has aroused considerable anger in the international community that do support the agreement. Science is not a strong suit for President Trump, and he has in the past called climate change ‘a hoax’ perpetrated by the Chinese. He has few, if any, supporters in this belief and already a number of American cities are saying that they will go ahead with measures already in play or in development to move towards alternative energy sources and reduce their carbon emissions. As with just about everything else concerning the Trump presidency division is the watchword. America first? Not this time.
Published in The Express Tribune, June 3rd, 2017.
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