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Most countries miss UN deadline for new climate targets

Brussels, Belgium Reuters Many of the world’s biggest polluter nations have missed a UN deadline to set new climate targets as efforts to curb global warming come under pressure following US President Donald Trump’s election. The nearly 200 countries signed up to the Paris Agreement faced a Monday deadline to submit new national climate plans […]

Last year – 2024 – was the first year above 1.5 degrees of global warming, scientists say

Brussels, Belgium Reuters The world just experienced the first full year in which global temperatures exceeded 1.5 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial times, scientists said on Friday. The milestone was confirmed by the European Union’s Copernicus Climate Change Service (C3S), which said climate change is pushing the planet’s temperature to levels never before experienced by modern […]

Rich countries, island states lock horns on climate change at UN court

The Hague, The Netherlands Reuters The World Court concludes hearings on Friday on countries’ legal obligation to fight climate change and whether large states contributing most to greenhouse-gas emissions should be liable for damage caused to small island nations. The International Court of Justice will issue an opinion on those questions, likely in 2025, that […]

Climate change set to drive more deadly heat in South Asia

India girl carrying water

Dhaka, Bangladesh Thomson Reuters Foundation Deadly heatwaves in South Asia are likely to become more common in the future, with the region’s exposure to lethal heat stress potentially nearly tripling if global warming isn’t curbed, researchers said. But the threat could be halved if the world meets a goal set under the Paris Agreement on […]

Pandemic delays leave many nations facing climate action catch-up in 2021

Burning globe

Barcelona, Spain Thomson Reuters Foundation Less than half of countries that committed to strengthening their climate action targets in 2020 did so by the end of last year, as the pandemic slowed climate diplomacy and efforts to update national plans, a developing-nation group said on Friday. A tracker run by the Climate Vulnerable Forum showed 73 […]

About 150 nations due to deliver stronger climate plans in 2020, tracker shows

India Mumbair floods Sept 20

Barcelona, Spain Thomson Reuters Foundation More than three-quarters of countries have indicated they will make stronger commitments under the Paris Agreement on climate change by the end of 2020, despite the economic strain of the coronavirus pandemic, a new tracker showed this week. According to the tool, launched by the Climate Vulnerable Forum of developing countries, 151 […]

Climate-menaced nations say survival depends on stronger 2020 action

Climate strike Mumbai India

Barcelona, Spain Thomson Reuters Foundation Developing countries at risk from wilder weather and rising seas on Wednesday urged all governments to meet a deadline to deliver stronger national climate action plans to the United Nations by the end of 2020, stressing that their survival depended on it. About 195 nations committed under the 2015 Paris […]

Political ‘retreat’ on climate action harms all nations, says UN climate chief

London, UKThomson Reuters Foundation Rich nations are failing on promises to help poorer ones meet the goals of the Paris Agreement on climate change, even though such help would be “not charity but a global act of self-interest”, UN climate chief Patricia Espinosa said on Monday. In an unusually pointed speech, she decried the erosion […]