Climate change a 'security and foreign relations' issue

Climate change has become a worldwide "security" and foreign relations issue, former UN under-secretary-general Maurice Strong said in Beijing yesterday.

China has its responsibility of tackling global warming, but the real solution lies in cooperation at the highest international level, in which the developed countries should take the lead, he said. Instead, the developed countries are shying away from their responsibility.

"What I see today is a tendency among some industrialized countries, notably the US, to shift the onus on China, India and other developing countries to divert attention from their own commitment," he said in his address to the China Foreign Affairs University Forum.