Syria agrees to join Paris Climate Accord News
Syria agrees to join Paris Climate Accord

Syria announced on Tuesday during UN Climate Change Conference (COP23) [official website] in Bonn, Germany, that the nation is poised to send its ratification of the Paris Climate Accord [text, PDF] to the UN. The Syria People’s Assembly voted to approve ratification of the agreement last month.

Syria, a nation engrossed in a civil war since 2011, was not present at the 2015 negotiations for the climate agreement.

The country has not yet submitted [NYT report] targets for cutting greenhouse gases. Syria produces a small portion of CO2 emissions, but every country that is party to the accord has produced a plan for cutting carbon output.

This announcement leaves the US as the lone country in the world to reject the pact after President Donald Trump announced in a Rose Garden speech this summer that the US would withdraw [JURIST report] from the agreement.

The Paris Agreement is the world’s first comprehensive pact seeking to reduce carbon emissions and halt climate change. The threshold of 55 parties, making up more than 55 percent of global greenhouse gas emissions, triggering the entry into force of the agreement was reached [JURIST report] in October. In September US President Barack Obama and Chinese President Xi Jinping formally committed [JURIST report] their nations to the Paris Agreement. These two nations alone are responsible for roughly 40 percent of the world’s total carbon emissions.