Developed nations obliged to shoulder climate responsibility

The death toll from last month's deadly mudslide in Nepal has continued to rise as rescue operations remain ongoing.

Days after the tragedy, the focus is on an important question: what was the cause?

There is growing consensus around a single, sobering answer: climate change. Due to the long-term effects of the rising global temperature, a glacier collapsed, leading to the disaster.

For Nepal, climate change is not an abstract topic for debate, but an urgent issue reshaping rainfall patterns, melting glaciers, intensifying disasters and threatening the safety of human life and property.

For this reason, some people are demanding compensation from the world's major emitters of greenhouse gases.

According to the United Nations Environment Programme, despite increasingly strengthened global consensus on the need to limit global average temperature rise to 1.5 C above preindustrial levels in order to avert catastrophic consequences, the world remains on track to overshoot this goal; the most optimistic scenarios point to a peak warming of around 1.8 C before a possible decline.

The main responsibility for climate change lies with the United States and other developed countries, whose historical emissions are the principal cause of accumulated greenhouse gases in the atmosphere. These industrialized countries used up a disproportionate share of the world's carbon budget long before developing countries had the opportunity to modernize.

We should also not judge responsibility only by a country's total annual emissions: per capita emissions and development stages are equally important. Also, large developing countries with huge populations cannot be assessed by the same standard as wealthy countries whose people have enjoyed high-carbon lifestyles for generations.

In 2024, for instance, the per capita carbon dioxide emissions from burning fossil fuels and industrial processes in the US were about 14.2 metric tons, far higher than China's 8.66 tonnes, according to the dataset of Our World in Data, based on the Global Carbon Budget (2025).

Developed countries, especially those with the largest historical emissions, must shoulder greater responsibility to help vulnerable developing countries build up their early-warning systems.

Clearly, mitigation remains essential, but it is not enough on its own. Adaptation must be placed on an equal footing. Vulnerable countries need stronger early-warning systems, resilient infrastructure, safer land-use planning, disaster preparedness and predictable finance for loss and damage.

Having reaped the prosperity born of two centuries of carbon-intensive industrialization, the developed nations have not only the financial and technological means to act, but also the inescapable historical obligation to do so.

Climate change is a global challenge that requires the collective efforts of all parties. China has been a steadfast actor and major contributor in promoting global green development. It is making active and sound efforts toward its carbon peaking and neutrality goals and is expected to make the world's biggest cut in carbon emissions intensity.

China, which was also severely affected by this mudslide, firmly upholds the legitimate and lawful rights and interests of the developing world, strives for a fair and equitable global climate governance system for win-win cooperation, and provides assistance to other developing countries to the best of its capability via South-South cooperation.

China and Nepal are a community with a shared future linked by mountains and rivers. As Chinese Foreign Ministry spokesman Guo Jiakun stressed, China is ready to strengthen cooperation with Nepal and the rest of the international community to jointly prevent and mitigate the negative impact of climate change.