Charles presses for face- to-face Biden meeting on climate
THE Prince of Wales wants a face-to-face meeting with US President Joe Biden to discuss the ‘ urgent issue of climate change’ and win support for his most ambitious environmental project to date.
The two men are due to meet at a Buckingham Palace reception ahead of June’s G7 summit in Cornwall on climate change, but Prince Charles has asked aides to liaise with the Foreign Office to arrange a meeting ‘at the earliest opportunity’.
Charles is said to be willing to fly to America to talk to Mr Biden, although it is thought this might breach protocol as the Queen is usually the first to meet a new President.
Sources say the Prince sees Mr Biden, six years his senior, as a key environmental ally.
Charles wrote to Mr Biden in January to congratulate him on his inauguration and is said to be ‘ hugely encouraged’ that one of his first acts as President was to rejoin the Paris
Agreement, the international treaty on tackling global warming, after Donald Trump pulled out in 2020.
A source said the Prince and Mr Biden shared ‘ the same indisputable view that the global climate crisis is the biggest threat to humankind and needs to be dealt with as a matter of utter urgency.’
Charles and the Duchess of Cornwall visited the White House in March 2015 and met President Barack Obama and Mr Biden, then Vice-President, in the oval office.
It also helps that Charles has a good rapport with John Kerry, the former Secretary of State, who Mr Biden has chosen to be the US climate envoy.
Support from the US will be needed for Charles’s l atest venture, Terra Carta, which a source described as ‘the culmination of 50 years of campaigning on the environment and sustainability.’ Terra Carta – the Earth charter – urges businesses to sign up to almost 100 actions to make industry more environmentally friendly by 2030.
The heir to the throne described the charter as ‘ an urgent appeal’ to ‘bring prosperi t y i nt o harmony wit h nature, people and planet over the coming decade’. Charles invoked the spirit of England’s Magna Carta, which 800 years ago inspired the belief in rights and human liberties, adding: ‘ As we strive to imagine the next 8 0 0 years o f human progress, t he f undamental rights and value of nature must represent a step-change.’
It is arguably the Prince’s most important project yet and one which he hopes will secure his legacy. It is also hoped Mr Biden will be a linchpin, encouraging company chief executives to sign up to the charter.
It’s not just the planet that is running short of time, however. Charles is said to be well aware that his campaigning will be curtailed when he ascends the throne. As King, he will not enjoy the same freedom to pursue his own projects. A source said: ‘ The environment has always been a chief concern and now more than ever.’