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US President-elect Joe Biden delivers a pre-Thanksgiving speech at his transition headquarters in Wilmington, Delaware, USA, on November 25, 2020. REUTERS / Joshua Roberts / Photo File / File Photo
NEW YORK – US President-elect Joe Biden spoke with UN Secretary-General Antonio Guterres on Monday, Biden’s transition team said, discussing the need for a “strengthened partnership” to combat the pandemic in COVID-19 and climate change, two areas in which President Donald Trump rejected a multilateral approach.
Trump has referred to climate change as a “hoax” and in 2017 pulled the United States out of a global agreement to address climate change, a decision that took effect on November 4. Biden vowed to rejoin the deal, which was agreed in 2015.
Trump also cut funding to the World Health Organization and also announced plans for the United States to withdraw from the world body, a decision that would have taken effect in July of next year. Trump has accused the WHO of becoming a puppet for China amid the coronavirus pandemic. Biden has said he will overturn Trump’s decision.
Biden and Guterres also discussed “addressing the humanitarian need; promote sustainable development; maintain peace and security and resolve conflicts; and promoting democracy and human rights, ”Biden’s transition team said in a statement.
Biden expressed his deep concern to Guterres about the escalation of violence in Ethiopia and the risk it poses to civilians.
Ethiopian Prime Minister Abiy Ahmed praised his troops on Monday for overthrowing a northern movement, but the leader of the Tigrayan forces said they were still holding out amid fears of a protracted guerrilla conflict.
The nearly month-long war has killed hundreds and possibly thousands of people, sent refugees to Sudan, entangled Eritrea and sparked rivalries among Ethiopia’s myriad ethnic groups.
Guterres spoke with Abiy on Sunday, UN spokesman Stephane Dujarric said, calling for full respect for human rights and access to humanitarian aid.
“The Secretary General also said that Ethiopia needed a true reconciliation, without discrimination … where each community should feel respected and be part of Ethiopia,” Dujarric told reporters on Monday.
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