Under the Trump administration, the US – the world’s second-largest carbon polluter – will become the first country to withdraw from the UN climate convention, a key bedrock for international climate diplomacy, in a move that will cut it off from global decision-making on climate change.

On January 7, the White House issued a presidential memorandum announcing that the US will quit 31 UN bodies, among them the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC). It will also leave 35 other international organisations – many of them environmental – including the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), the most authoritative global voice on climate science.

While the Trump administration already gave notice nearly a year ago that the US would quit the Paris Agreement, under which countries agreed to limit global warming to “well below” 2 degrees Celsius, it did not at that time attempt to leave the UNFCCC. The climate convention, adopted in 1992, is the bedrock of the world’s efforts to curb climate change and tackle its impacts.

The US has already ceased all funding to the UNFCCC, and would be the only nation to formally exit the convention. After officially notifying the UN of its decision, the withdrawal will take effect after a period of one year.

The country has also decided to exit key organisations for nature conservation, including the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN), which publishes a “red list” of endangered species, and the Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services (IPBES), the scientific advisory body to the UN biodiversity convention.

In addition, the US will leave the International Renewable Energy Agency (IRENA) and the International Solar Alliance (ISA), both of which promote the use of renewable energy.

In a statement, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said “we will stop subsidizing globalist bureaucrats who act against our interests”, adding that US membership of other international organisations remains under review.

“The Trump Administration has found these institutions to be redundant in their scope, mismanaged, unnecessary, wasteful, poorly run, captured by the interests of actors advancing their own agendas contrary to our own, or a threat to our nation’s sovereignty, freedoms, and general prosperity,” Rubio said.

Rejoining possible

The US Senate ratified the UNFCCC in 1992, which experts said raises questions about the legality of Trump’s move to exit through an executive order.

But legal scholars have indicated that the Senate would not need to ratify the UN climate convention again if the country wishes to rejoin.

In a blog, Jake Schmidt, senior strategic director for international climate at the Natural Resources Defense Council (NRDC) wrote that, based on the Senate’s original “advice and consent”, the US could once again become a party to the UNFCCC 90 days after such a decision were formalised.

Indian law enforcement targets climate activists accused of opposing fossil fuels

Sue Biniaz, the US State Department’s former principal deputy special envoy for climate until January 2025, said she hoped the federal retreat would be “a temporary one”.

“There are multiple future pathways to rejoining the key climate agreements,” she added, saying she agreed with treaty scholars who consider the US “could rather seamlessly rejoin” the UNFCCC based on the Senate’s 1992 approval.

Forfeiting influence

Experts criticised the move, saying it would isolate the US from global policy-making on climate change and disadvantage Americans in adapting to its worsening effects. But many expressed optimism that the rest of the world would continue to push forward with efforts to curb planet-warming emissions.

The NRDC’s Schmidt noted, however, that the US absence would “complicate the climate negotiations, as a major economy pulling in the wrong direction always makes forging global progress more difficult”.

Former US climate envoy John Kerry said Trump’s decision is “a gift to China and a get-out-of-jail-free card to countries and polluters who want to avoid responsibility”. He added that “the price is always paid by kids, in lost health, squandered jobs, rising costs, uninsurable infrastructure, and worse consequences.”

Gina McCarthy, a former Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) administrator and the first White House National Climate Advisor under Joe Biden, said the move to quit the UNFCCC is “a shortsighted, embarrassing, and foolish decision”, as the country will forfeit influence over “trillions of dollars in investments, policies, and decisions that would have advanced our economy and protected us from costly disasters wreaking havoc on our country”.

McCarthy, who now chairs “America Is All In”, a coalition of US cities, states and businesses and institutions working on climate action, said her organisation is committed to collaborating with international partners “to lower energy costs, cut pollution, and deliver on the goals of the Paris Agreement”.

Comment: COP presidencies should focus less on climate policy, more on global politics

David Widawsky, director of the World Resources Institute US, described the US withdrawal from the UN climate convention as a “strategic blunder that gives away American advantage for nothing in return”. But, he added, global climate diplomacy “will not falter” since other countries “understand the UNFCCC’s irreplaceable role” in advancing climate solutions and driving cooperation.

On the decision to quit the IPCC, Delta Merner, associate accountability campaign director for the Climate and Energy Program at the Union of Concerned Scientists, said President Trump is “deliberately cutting our nation’s formal participation off from the world’s most trusted source of climate science”.

While individual US scientists can still contribute, the country will “no longer be able to help guide the scientific assessments that governments around the world rely on”, she added in a statement.

The post Trump to pull US out of UN climate convention and climate science body appeared first on Climate Home News.

Trump to pull US out of UN climate convention and climate science body

Announcing the capture of Venezuelan President Nicolás Maduro in a raid by US military forces at the weekend, Donald Trump made no secret of his ambitions to revive the South American nation’s ailing oil industry.

“We’re going to have our very large United States oil companies, the biggest anywhere in the world, go in, spend billions of dollars, fix the badly broken infrastructure … and start making money for the country,” the US president told a press conference on Saturday, saying the US would “run” Venezuela.

Venezuela has the largest proven crude oil reserves of any country in the world, but production in the largely state-controlled industry has fallen sharply over the past decade amid rampant corruption, mismanagement and crippling sanctions. 

What are the climate risks of an oil production boost?

A significant production boost would unleash vast amounts of planet-heating greenhouse gases, particularly because Venezuela’s tar-like heavy oil requires energy-intensive extraction and processing techniques.

The Venezuelan oil industry’s methane emissions are also among the highest in the world per unit of oil produced, as excess gas is routinely burned rather than captured. Additionally, the country’s abandoned oil wells released at least 3 million metric tons of methane last year, according to the International Energy Agency (IEA).

“If oil production goes up, climate change will get worse sooner, and everybody loses, including the people of Venezuela,” John Sterman, an expert in climate and economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, told Climate Home News.

“The climate damages suffered by Venezuela, along with other countries, will almost certainly outweigh any short-term economic benefit of selling a bit more oil,” Sterman said.

How likely is a new Venezuelan oil boom?

Venezuela’s distinctive dense and sticky oil, coupled with wider energy market dynamics, mean experts do not expect a surge in output in the short, or even longer, term. 

Getting the oil out of the ground would require eye-watering levels of investment to bring in the necessary technology and expertise. Restoring Venezuela’s oil production to its late-1990s peak of 3 million barrels a day would require $20 billion more in capital investment than the top five US oil majors combined spent globally in 2024, according to consultancy Rystad Energy. 

What’s on the climate calendar for 2026?

US Secretary of State Marco Rubio told journalists “we are pretty certain that there will be dramatic interest from Western companies”, without naming any specific firms. By Tuesday, the three biggest US oil companies, ExxonMobil, Chevron and ConocoPhillips, had not yet held any discussions with the Trump administration about Maduro’s removal, Reuters reported, but a meeting was expected by the end of the week. 

According to a BloombergNEF analysis, the three US companies have cheaper and more stable investment options in Guyana, which borders Venezuela, along with Alaska and the Gulf of Mexico. It said the companies would need “stronger incentives” to lift production in Venezuela.

Does the world need more oil from Venezuela?

Oil majors might need a lot of convincing to pour cash into projects that could take years to yield results, especially when the world is in the midst of an oil glut. In 2025, crude oil production significantly outpaced demand, pushing prices down to the lowest level since the COVID-19 pandemic, according to the Energy Information Administration (EIA), a US federal agency.

With oil demand expected to peak around 2030 under a scenario based on governments’ stated climate policies, as outlined by the IEA, any increase in Venezuelan oil output risks entering a market that may be smaller and more competitive by the time new supplies come online.

In China, currently the biggest importer of Venezuelan crude, oil demand for fuel production has already flatlined due to the strong adoption of electric vehicles.

Does the US have other reasons to control Venezuela’s oil?

Geopolitics, rather than economics, might have played a bigger role in the US intervention.

Rubio said that while the US did not need Venezuela’s oil, it would not let the country’s oil industry be controlled by US adversaries, such as China, Russia and Iran.

“This is where we live, and we’re not going to allow the Western Hemisphere to be a base of operation for adversaries, competitors, and rivals of the United States,” Rubio said. “It’s as simple as that”.

“New era of climate extremes” as global warming fuels devastating impacts in 2025

In response, Colombia’s environment minister Irene Vélez said on X that the US “attack” on Venezuela paved the way for “a new fossil colonialism and the end of peaceful multilateralism”.

A group of Latin American countries including Brazil, Mexico and Chile issued a statement expressing concern over “any attempt at governmental control, administration, or external appropriation of natural or strategic resources, which would be incompatible with international law”.

How can the world protect itself from militarism over fossil fuels?

Climate advocates say the lesson that countries reliant on fossil fuel imports should draw from Trump’s actions in Venezuela is to shift away from oil and gas as fast as possible.

Mads Christensen, executive director at Greenpeace International, said “the only safe path forward is a just transition away from fossil fuels, one that protects health, safeguards ecosystems, and supports communities rather than sacrificing them for short-term profit”.

At COP30, more than 80 countries publicly endorsed the creation of a fossil fuel transition roadmap. The initiative will move its first steps this year under the Brazilian presidency, in partnership with the Colombian government, which will host the first global conference dedicated to the issue.

“This weekend’s events should be a nudge to them all to get to work this January and start drafting emergency plans to implement this,” said Mike Davis, chief executive of the Global Witness campaign group. “The longer they delay – and the fossil fuel lobbying machine will try and delay – the weaker their strategic positions will be.”

The post What would Trump’s Venezuela oil plans mean for climate change? appeared first on Climate Home News.

What would Trump’s Venezuela oil plans mean for climate change?

Indian police have raided the homes and offices of high-profile Indian climate activists, on the orders of the government’s Enforcement Directorate, accusing them of jeopardising India’s energy security by campaigning against fossil fuels.

The Delhi home and offices of Harjeet Singh and his partner Jyoti Awasthi, who are co-founders of Satat Sampada Private Limited (SSPL) and Satat Sampada Climate Foundation, were searched on Monday in an operation that led to Singh’s arrest, according to a press release by the Enforcement Directorate (ED).

A statement issued on Wednesday by Satat Sampada, which promotes organic farming, sustainable development, climate action and environmental friendly solutions, said Singh had been granted bail on Tuesday by the District Court of Ghaziabad “on the merits of the case”.

The Hindustan Times reported, based on conversations with anonymous officials, that the ED had also searched the home of Sanjay Vashisht, director of Climate Action Network South Asia.

While the ED has not publicly announced its raid on Vashisht’s residence, it said that Satat Sampada was investigated on suspicion of illegally using around $667,000 in funding from outside India “to promote the agenda of the Fossil Fuel Non-Proliferation Treaty (FF-NPT) within India”.

Singh’s social media profiles state that he is a strategic advisor to the FFNPT Initiative. It is a non-governmental campaign that advocates for a “concrete, binding plan to end the expansion of new coal, oil and gas projects and manage a global transition away from fossil fuels”. Eighteen countries – mainly small islands – have so far backed the idea, along with 145 cities and subnational governments including India’s Kolkata.

India’s ED said on the FFNPT that while “presented as a climate initiative, its adoption could expose India to legal challenges in international forums like the International Court of Justice (ICJ) and severely compromise the nation’s energy security and economic development”.

The FFNPT Initiative declined to comment on the reports of Singh’s arrest.

In the statement issued by Satat Sampada on their behalf, Singh and Aswathi, who serves as its CEO, highlighted media reports about the raid and arrest, saying: “We categorically state that the allegations being reported are baseless, biased, and misleading.”

Warning of further crackdown

The Hindustan Times cited an anonymous ED official saying: “We received intelligence around the COP30 [climate summit] that some climate activists were campaigning against fossil fuels at the behest of some foreign organizations…This is when we decided to look at [Singh’s] foreign funding”. Another officer added that “similar activists or organisations whose climate campaigns may be inimical to India’s energy security are under the scanner”.

The ED said it suspected that Satat Sampada had received money from campaign groups like Climate Action Network and Stand.Earth, which in turn had received funds from “prior reference category” NGOs like Rockefeller Philanthrophy Advisors. Indian individuals and organisations are supposed to obtain permission from India’s Ministry of Home Affairs to receive funds from foreign donor agencies included in this “prior reference category”.

The ED’s statement did not mention finding any evidence in the search that Satat Sampada breached this requirements. But it said that bottles of liquor were discovered at Singh’s home which were “beyond the permissible limits”.

Singh was arrested on suspicion of breaching excise laws for the state of Uttar Pradesh. The ED’s statement and the Hindustan Times do not state that Awasthi and Vashisht were arrested.

Singh and Aswathi said in their statement that, during the ED search, “we fully cooperated and provided all relevant information and documentary evidence. We remain willing to extend complete cooperation and furnish any further information required by the competent authorities.”

“We urge media organisations to report responsibly and avoid speculation. We reiterate our faith in due process and the rule of law,” they added.

Climate Action Network International and its South Asia branch have been contacted for comment.

Climate justice advocate

Singh is a veteran international climate campaigner who has been particularly vocal on the responsibility of rich countries with historically high emissions to provide finance to help developing nations like India cut their emissions, adapt to climate change and deal with the loss and damage caused by global warming.

At COP30, Singh praised the Indian government for turning the “pressure back on wealthy nations, making it clear that the path to 1.5C requires the Global North to reach net zero far earlier than current target dates and finally deliver the trillions in finance owed”.

In 2020, India passed the Indian Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Amendment Bill which restricted foreign funding for Indian civil society groups. A December 2025 research paper in environmental politics pointed to this as an example of a growing trend among governments to repress climate activists by restricting funding.

In 2021, the Indian government arrested young climate activist Disha Ravi on suspicion of sedition for supporting protests by farmers against government policies. Nearly five years later, she remains on bail with conditions preventing her from travelling abroad.

India has yet to publish its latest national climate action plan, which it was due to submit to the United Nations climate body in 2025 along with other countries, around 70 of which have yet to do so.

The post Indian law enforcement targets climate activists accused of opposing fossil fuels appeared first on Climate Home News.

Indian law enforcement targets climate activists accused of opposing fossil fuels