U.S. Will Withdraw from Paris Agreement: Trump

U.S. President Donald Trump said on Thursday that he has decided to pull the United States out of the Paris Agreement, a landmark global pact to fight climate change.

The U.S. will stop honoring non-binding parts of the deal “as of today,” Trump said at a Press Conference in the White House Rose Garden.

Trump’s decision to withdraw the United States from the Paris Agreement fulfilled a campaign promise, but was expected to meet widespread opposition both at home and abroad.

Before the decision on Thursday, Trump, who once called climate change a “hoax,” had already taken a series of actions aimed at reversing his predecessor Barack Obama’s climate policies.

The Paris Agreement of climate change, agreed on by almost every country in the world in 2015 after lengthy negotiations, aims to tackle climate change by cutting greenhouse gas emissions and sets a global target of keeping the rise in the average temperature no higher than 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels. (Xinhua)