Unfair to blame climate crisis on developing countries: Media

It is not fair to blame developing countries like India and China for the climate crisis, according to Euronews, a France-based European television news network.

The news outlet said some critics are "sorely lacking historical and geographical context" in claiming that India's pledge to achieve carbon neutrality by 2070 is not in step with Western countries' 2050 targets.

"The global north has a moral and historic obligation to act first," the news website quoted Daniel Willis, a climate campaigner, as saying.

Statistics compiled by Carbon Brief, a website specializing in climate change, show the United States' cumulative historic carbon emissions per capita are nearly 8 times higher than China's, and about 30 times higher than India's, based on an analysis of emissions between 1850 to 2021.

According to Carbon Brief, the US is responsible for the largest share of historical emissions, with some 20 percent of the global total. China follows with 11 percent.

The Euronews report pointed out that while China and India are major carbon emitters, with China responsible for about 28 percent of the global total, and India 7 percent, the two countries are home to more than a third of the planet's people.

It said that developed countries are increasingly transferring manufacturing industries to developing countries such as China and India, whose products are exported worldwide.

"We in the rich world have built our economies by fueling the climate crisis, reaping the benefits of carbon emissions while destroying the planet. This is fundamentally our problem to address, but we have repeatedly broken our own climate promises," Daniel was quoted as saying.

China has pledged to attain carbon neutrality by 2060.