Stormy climate at G7 as Trump goes his own way on Paris pact
TAORMINA: G7 nations on Saturday hit deadlock over climate change and strived to finesse divisions over trade, as US President Donald Trump rebuffed pressure to toe the collective line in the club of powerful democracies.
Trump tweeted that he would reveal his hand only next week as to whether he will keep the United States in the Paris accord, a global pact on curbing carbon emissions that he vowed to jettison when campaigning for the White House.
The Group of Seven leading economies, in an extraordinary summit statement, acknowledged that six members were committed to upholding the 2015 accord while the United States stood apart.
“The United States of America is in the process of reviewing its policies on climate change and on the Paris Agreement and thus is not in a position to join the consensus on these topics,” the statement said in highly unusual language.
German Chancellor Angela Merkel, who also crossed swords with Trump on free trade at the G7, complained that the US president was keeping his colleagues in the dark.
“The whole discussion on the topic of climate was very difficult, not to say very unsatisfactory,” she told reporters, labelling the G7 deadlock as “six against one”.
On trade, the G7 vowed “to keep our markets open and to fight protectionism”, but also to combat “unfair trade practices” and help those left behind by globalisation, after Trump came to power vowing “America First”.