China hopes US will rejoin Paris climate agreement

BEIJING - China hopes the United States will rejoin the Paris climate agreement and contribute to the global agenda on fighting climate change, a senior envoy said Tuesday.

China is willing to step up cooperation with the United States in climate change negotiations after the U.S. said it will stay in the talks although it has withdrawn from the accord, China's Special Representative on Climate Change Xie Zhenhua told a press conference.

China has made it clear that it is willing to enhance cooperation with the United States in the areas of clean energy utilization, energy and resource conservation, carbon capture and storage, as well as other research and development, he said.

The Paris Agreement, agreed on by almost every country in the world in 2015, aims to tackle climate change by cutting greenhouse gas emissions and sets a global target of keeping the average temperature rise no higher than 2 degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels.

US President Donald Trump said in June that he had decided to pull the United States out of this landmark global pact.