May slaps down demand

Prime Minister Theresa May has delivered a rebuke to Donald Trump over his demand to renegotiate the Paris Agreement on tackling climate change.

In her keynote speech to the United Nations General Assembly in New York shortly before a private meeting with the US President yesterday, the PM called on all countries to “come together and defend” the rules-based system of international agreements and conventions such as the Paris accord and nuclear nonproliferation treaties.

Mrs May singled out Syria and North Korea for condemnation as she warned that the system was threatened by “states deliberately flouting for their own gain the rules and standards that have secured our collective prosperity and security”.

Security Council members should be “prepared to take all necessary measures” to exert pressure on Kim Jong-Un and restore stability to the Korean peninsula, she said.

The PM also called on the United Nations to reform, warning that Britain will make up to 30% of its annual £90 million core funding for the organisation’s agencies conditional on it making good on new secretary general Antonio Guterres’s drive to make it “more agile, transparent and joined-up”.

Mrs May specifically condemned the “unforgiveable” use of chemical weapons by Bashar Assad’s regime in Syria and the “outrageous” development of nuclear weapons by North Korea.

Without mentioning Mr Trump or the US by name, she made clear that she regards it as vital that all UN states stick by their commitments in agreements to tackle issues ranging from security to trade protectionism and climate change.

“I believe that the only way for us to respond to this vast array of challenges is to come together and defend the international order that we have worked so hard to create and the values by which we stand,” said Mrs May.

Picture: AP. Theresa May, right, and Foreign Secretary Boris Johnson attend a high level meeting yesterday.