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Javier Milei’s government is considering a proposal for Argentina to leave the Paris agreement, days after Donald Trump announced the United States would withdraw from the key global agreement on climate change.
Although a final decision has not yet been made, two people familiar with the discussions said Argentina was likely to follow in the footsteps of the United States, which would make it the second country to leave the agreement signed by nearly 200 countries.
Senior officials are studying an internal memo recommending an exit, people briefed on the situation said, after the country withdrew negotiators from last year’s COP29 climate summit and said it was reassess its international commitments on the environment.
Officials were seeking to dissuade Milei’s team from leaving the deal, the sources said. An Argentine diplomat said Milei would make the final decision and that “it seems very likely that we will end up leaving.”
A departure, if agreed, would deal a major blow to global efforts to combat climate change. The agreement aims to limit global temperature rise to well below 2°C and ideally to 1.5°C above pre-industrial levels.
The environmental division of Argentina’s Interior Ministry did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The libertarian leader, who denies that man is a cause of climate change, condemned the global environmental movement on Thursday in a speech at the World Economic Forum in Davos.
“Wokism has perverted the basic idea of preserving the environment for the enjoyment of human beings and transformed it into fanatical environmentalism where human beings are a cancer that must be eliminated and economic development is nothing less than a crime against nature,” he said. said.
Monday, Trump signed an executive order to withdraw the United States from the Paris agreement for the second time, after leaving it during his first term. No other countries left the 2015 agreement.
Exiting the Paris agreement would require approval from Argentina’s Congress, but Milei has often bypassed Congress via emergency decrees during his presidency.
Last year was the hottest on record, with scientists saying the world is falling further behind in meeting the temperature targets set out in the agreement.
A withdrawal could affect the EU-Mercosur trade deal reached in December between Europe and Argentina, Brazil, Paraguay and Uruguay, which specifies that the parties can suspend the trade agreement if one of the signatories leaves the Paris agreement.
A diplomat said: “The technical staff of the ministry is trying to explain that even if Trump can do whatever he wants, it would have consequences for Argentina. »
They also discussed potential complications related to Argentina’s recently launched bid to join the OECD, which advocates environmental policy standards for its members.
Critics have argued that Argentina would also risk losing access to international climate-related finance flows, having received billions in such funding, and could be excluded from global carbon markets in the future.
Countries are expected to submit their updated climate plans under the Paris agreement next month, although many are expected to miss the deadline.