One empty chair at G-7 climate meeting: Donald Trump’s
French President Emmanuel Macron shrugged off Trump's absence, saying it wasn't his goal to try to persuade Trump to rejoin the climate accord. "You can't rewrite the past," he said.
From the left, French President Emmanuel Macron, Egyptian President and Chairman of the African Union Abdel Fattah al-Sissi, Chile's President Sebastian Pinera and German Chancellor Angela Merkel attend a work session focused on climate in Biarritz, southwestern France, Monday Aug. 26, 2019, on the third day of the annual G7 Summit. The empty seat at third right was the place reserved for President Donald Trump, who according to Macron had skipped Monday's working session on the climate. At the same time Macron said that Trump supported an initiative by G-7 countries for an immediate $20 million fund to help Amazon countries fight wildfires and launch a long-term global initiative to protect the rainforest. (Ludovic Marin, Pool via AP) 
The empty seat at third right was the place reserved for President Donald Trump, who according to Macron had skipped Monday’s working session on the climate. (AP)
US President Donald Trump skipped a discussion on climate with other world leaders at the Group of Seven summit in France, leaving an empty chair as global power brokers debated how to help the fire-ravaged Amazon and reduce carbon emissions.
Trump was scheduled to attend Monday’s session on climate, biodiversity and oceans at the G-7 summit in Biarritz , but didn’t. French President Emmanuel Macron, the summit host, said Trump’s aides were there instead.
Trump is a climate change skeptic who once had claimed it’s a hoax that was invented by the Chinese. His decision to withdraw the United States from the 2015 Paris climate accord has severely damaged global efforts to reduce emissions.
Trump started the morning behind schedule, and held one-on-one meetings while others were in the climate discussions. However, one of his interlocutors, German Chancellor Angela Merkel, managed to make it to the climate meeting.
The empty chair of U.S. President Donald Trump is seen during a working session focused on climate change during the G7 Summit in Biarritz, France, August 26, 2019. (Reuters)
Trump then met with Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi, where he was asked about attending the climate session. Trump said it would be his next stop and that he wants clean air and water.
But he never showed up.
Macron shrugged off Trump’s absence, saying it wasn’t his goal to try to persuade Trump to rejoin the climate accord. “You can’t rewrite the past,” Macron told reporters.
But Macron said he and Trump had a “long, rich and totally positive” discussion on the Amazon fires and an international effort to invest in “re-foresting” the area.
G-7 countries pledged USD 20 million on Monday to help fight fires in the Amazon rainforest, which threaten its ability to capture carbon released into the atmosphere by cars and other emitters. It’s a small sum overall but G-7 summit host France hopes it will bring more attention to the fires.
UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres – who attended Monday’s climate talks – expressed hope that Americans themselves would help fight climate change even if their president doesn’t.
“I am very optimistic about American society and its capacity to deliver in relation to climate action,” he told reporters afterward. “What matters here is to have a strong engagement of the American society and of the American business community and the American local authorities.”
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