Donald Trump pulls out of 2015 Paris climate deal citing need 'to protect America'

The US president has announced that he will withdraw from the Paris climate deal to keep his campaign promise to put "American workers first".

Donald Trump, said that the Paris climate agreement puts a cost on Americans and that negotiations for a new deal that would not disadvantage the US would begin.

He has said that the Paris accord struck in 2015 was poorly negotiated by the previous Obama administration.

The Paris agreement commits the US and 187 other countries to keeping temperatures below 2C (3.6F) above pre-industrial times and "endeavour to limit" them even more, to 1.5C.

"In order to fulfil my solemn duty to protect America and its citizens, the United States will withdraw from the Paris climate accord... but begin negotiations to re-enter either the Paris accord or a really entirely new transaction on terms that are fair to the United States," he said in the White House Rose Garden on Thursday (1 June).

"So we're getting out but we will start to negotiate and we will see if we can make a deal that's fair."

However France, Germany, Italy have issued a joint statement saying that Paris climate accord cannot be renegotiated.

A US withdrawal had been on the cards, but there was hope among those backing the deal that Trump would change his mind at the eleventh hour.

Trump has previously said he wanted to help his country's oil and coal industries but had faced an appeal from the United Nations Secretary General Antonio Guterres who emphasised the role that the world's biggest economy should play in tackling climate change.

However, the EU's commissioner for climate action and energy, Miguel Arias Cañete, said the climate accord would continue and that it would be global leaders who would fill the void left by the US departure from the deal.

He said: "Today is a sad day for the global community, as a key partner turns its back on the fight against climate change. The EU deeply regrets the unilateral decision by the Trump administration to withdraw the US from the Paris Agreement."

Natalie Samarasinghe, Executive Director of UNA-UK, said in a statement to IBTimes UK: "The US will find itself side-lined, alongside Syria and Nicaragua, in the most important discussion of our age. The leadership gap will likely be filled by new and mid-level powers, and by the global south.

"The USA is today a smaller country, and China a larger one, as a result of this decision."

Billionaire business leader Elon Musk has quit his role on presidential councils in protest, writing on Twitter: "Climate change is real. Leaving Paris is not good for America or the world."

Chinese and EU leaders are set to agree a joint statement backing the Paris agreement with Chinese Premier Li Keqiang has said his country will honour its commitments.

The French president Emmanuel Macron tweeted his response, saying: "Make our planet great again".

Downing Street said in a statement: "The Prime Minister expressed her disappointment with the decision and stressed that the UK remained committed to the Paris Agreement, as she set out recently at the G7.