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World leaders converged on Glasgow in Scotland as COP26 officially kicked off today.
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U.S. President Joe Biden, U.N. Secretary General Antonio Guterres, Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi...They are among the world leaders who descended upon Glasgow, a Scottish city, to attend this year's climate summit, better known as COP26.
It goes without saying, global warming was front and centre at today's opening ceremony, and world leaders all sang from the same song sheet.
Officiating at the opening ceremony, British Prime Minister, Boris Johnson, who didn't paint a rosy picture of the world's future, kicked off COP26 by warning the entire world is strapped to a doomsday device, and that this is not a figment of our imagination.
Boris Johnson, British PM: Welcome to Glasgow, and to Scotland, whose most globally famous fictional son is almost certainly a man called James Bond, who generally comes to the climax of his highly lucrative films strapped to a doomsday device. And we are in roughly the same position, my fellow global leaders, as James Bond today, except that the tragedy is, this is not a movie.
Indian Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Britain's Prince of Wales also gave a few well-chosen words.
Meantime, U.S. President Joe Biden offered his apology for the U.S. pulling out of the Paris Accords during the Trump era.
Joe Biden, U.S. President: I do apologize for the fact the United States, in the last administration, pulled out of the Paris Accords and put us sort of behind the eight ball.
President Xi Jinping and Russian President Vladimir Putin are again notably absent from the meeting. Their absence is what is construed as apathy, something Biden has remonstrated against.
What's more, the Biden administration has also launched a multi-pronged plan for good measure. A plan with a view to curbing methane emissions, thereby averting an inevitable and disquieting corollary of intensifying global warming.
The plan was being enunciated on Tuesday as President Joe Biden wraps up his two-day appearance at COP26. The upshot of the plan: Methane emissions will be reduced by 30 percent worldwide by 2030.
Suffice it to say, the gist of what world leaders said in COP26's opening ceremony: Time is, for all intents and purposes, of the essence. It's a make-or-break attempt.
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