Macron Disregards Bolsonaro, Urges World to Join Fight Against Climate Change

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – French President Emmanuel Macron ignored Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro’s innuendos hours earlier and focused his speech at the UN General Assembly this Tuesday on the issue of courage, calling on the international community to unite in the fight against climate change and in building peace.

Stressing not wishing to seem pessimistic, the French leader stated that the world has the knowledge and innovative capacity to face these two issues.

“We are deeply aware of the world’s problems,” he said. – “What do we lack? Courage. We need to restore the courage to build peace and take responsibility for our actions.”

Using as examples the peace processes in South Sudan and the Sahel region in sub-Saharan Africa, Macron proposed an amendment to Iran’s nuclear agreement with global powers, unilaterally abandoned by the United States by President Donald Trump, stating that as a result of the recent attacks on oil facilities in Saudi Arabia, the Americans and other members of the pact must once again negotiate and suspend the sanctions against the Persian nation.

After briefly addressing the issue of inequality, from economic to gender, the president of France revisited his approach to climate change, saying that while the world has created a framework to fight climate change in the Paris Agreement, “it continues to act as it did in the past”:

“This cannot continue. We need to take tangible steps and change our collective approach. This is crucial if we are to keep global warming below two degrees Celsius. Courageous decisions need to be made now.”

According to Macron, the way to do this is outlined in the search for zero-carbon economies, such as the proposal put forward by dozens of countries the day before the UN Climate Summit.

However, the president of France acknowledged that profound changes in society will be required to achieve this.

“We are losing the battle,” he warned. “We need to change our habits of consumption, of production, of government so that together we may counter climate change.”

Source: O Globo