U.N. chief: Leadership lacking

UNITED NATIONS — The head of the United Nations blamed lack of leadership Wednesday for the world’s failure to take tough decisions needed to stop global warming, warning that a key goal of the Paris climate accord is at risk.

U.N. Secretary-general Antonio Guterres bluntly told leaders gathered in New York that unless current emission trends of greenhouse gases are reversed by 2020, it will be impossible to keep global warming below 2.7 degrees Fahrenheit. The target was set in the 2015 Paris agreement, but the U.N. says government commitments so far only achieve a third of cuts needed. comments in kind, saying that he and Trump “certainly have our differences, but that is what we have to dialogue about.”

“Donald Trump said he was worried about Venezuela, he wanted to help Venezuela,” Maduro said. “Good. I stand ready to talk with an open agenda on everything that he might wish to talk about with the United States of America.”

On Wednesday, presidents from five conservative Latin American governments and Canada’s prime minister met in New York and signed a complaint with the International Criminal Court, asking it to investigate Maduro on charges of crimes against humanity.

It’s the first time that member countries have referred another country to the Netherlands-based U.N. court. They pointed to a human rights report accusing Venezuelan security forces of carrying out arbitrary arrests, murders, extrajudicial executions, torture, sexual abuse and rape on orders from Maduro’s government.