Paris - Arab Today
French authorities said President Donald Trump is not among more than 100 world leaders invited to Paris for a climate summit next month.
French President Emmanuel Macron plans a summit to push his "Make our Planet Great Again" agenda on Dec. 12, the anniversary of the 2015 Paris climate accord.
The summit aims at promoting green projects and providing new funding sources, a few weeks after separate talks that are currently being held at a global climate conference in Bonn, Germany.
A French diplomatic official said the countries whose heads of state are being invited are those who are "especially committed" to applying the Paris accord.
An invitation will soon be sent to invite the United States "at a diplomatic level," the official said. He spoke on customary condition of anonymity.
Officially called the "One Planet Summit" in English, the event is also when Macron is going to announce the winners of his offer of a generous fellowship to U.S. climate scientists who come to do their research in France.
In June, Trump said that the U.S. would pull out of the 2015 Paris accord unless he can secure a better deal.
The same day, Macron said "wherever we live, whoever we are, we all share the same responsibility: make our planet great again" and called on U.S.-based scientists to come to France to work on climate-related issues, in an unprecedented English-language speech from the French presidential palace.
French organizers are expecting about 2,000 participants, including non-governmental organizations, foundations, banks, startups, local governments, city mayors and others.
France co-organizes the summit with the United Nations and the World Bank.
Source: AFP