Argentina mulls Paris climate agreement exit with Trump

BAKU, Azerbaijan — Argentina is weighing an exit from the Paris Agreement, joining the U.S. President-elect Donald Trump in reconsidering the global climate deal.
“We’re reevaluating our strategy on all matters related to climate change,” the country’s foreign minister, Gerardo Werthein, told The New York Times, adding that the country had fundamental doubts about what is driving climate change. The Washington Post also reported the news, citing an unnamed government official.
Argentina withdrew its delegation this week from the COP29 climate talks in Baku, Azerbaijan, just days into the two-week summit. Werthein told the Times no final decision had been made about the 2015 Paris accord, but noted Argentina was reconsidering participating in a deal that “has a lot of elements.”
“We decided to withdraw our delegation and reevaluate our position, nothing more,” Werthein said. “I think it’s a sovereign right.”
The Argentinian embassy in Baku did not respond to a request for comment.
Argentinian President Javier Milei has described climate change and the international effort to contain it as a “socialist lie.”
On Thursday, he met with Trump at the incoming president’s Mar-a-Lago club in Florida. Milei was the first head of state Trump received in person since winning the Nov. 5 election.
During his campaign, Trump said he would withdraw the United States from the Paris deal. The U.S. left briefly during Trump’s first term. But no other countries followed.
Trump’s election and the exit of Argentina’s diplomats have cast a shadow over this year’s COP, which is seeking a major new deal to help developing countries, including Argentina, finance clean energy and protect themselves from extreme weather.
Speaking to reporters in Baku about Milei’s order for Argentina’s negotiating team to leave the talks, the EU’s lead negotiator Jacob Werksman said: “It is worrying. It’s of course concerning whenever any party leaves the process.”
Zia Weise contributed to this report from Baku.