•US President Donald Trump
US President Donald Trump has ordered the country’s withdrawal from 66 global organisations.
The presidential declaration was signed yesterday following a review directed at the State Department earlier this year of all international intergovernmental organisations, conventions, and treaties that the US is a party to, reports AFP.
Trump directed all executive departments and agencies to take immediate steps to effect the country’s withdrawal from the organisations as soon as possible.
Of the 66 organisations, 31 are United Nations (UN) entities while 35 are non-UN affiliated.
Notable among the organisations include the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) and the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC), which, according to the White House, operate contrary to America’s national interests.
Upon returning to office last January, Trump initiated the withdrawal of the US from the World Health Organisation (WHO) and the Paris Climate Agreement.
Weeks later, he signed an executive order withdrawing the US from the UN Human Rights Council (UNHRC) and prohibiting any future funding for the UN Relief and Works Agency for the Near East (UNRWA).
UNFCCC addresses global climate efforts and coordinates international action on climate change through annual COP meetings and agreements like the Paris Accord. Trump has repeatedly labelled climate change a “scam”.
UNFPA promotes access to family planning, maternal healthcare, and efforts to end gender-based violence and harmful practices like child marriage. Historically, the US provided substantial funding to UNFPA for programmes in over 150 countries.
In a separate press statement, Marco Rubio, US Secretary of State, said the Trump administration found these institutions to be “redundant in their scope, mismanaged, unnecessary, wasteful, poorly run, captured by the interests of actors advancing their own agendas”.
“The days of billions of dollars in taxpayer money flowing to foreign interests at the expense of our people are over,” Rubio said.
EU Slams Trump On Withdrawal Order
President Donald Trump’s decision to withdraw the United States from a bedrock climate treaty was slammed today by the EU, which vowed to keep tackling the crisis with other nations.
The treaty adopted in 1992 is a global pact by nations to cooperate to drive down planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions and adapt to the impacts of climate change.
European Union climate chief Wopke Hoekstra said the UNFCCC “underpins global climate action” and brings nations together in the collective fight against the crisis.
“The decision by the world’s largest economy and second-largest emitter to retreat from it is regrettable and unfortunate,” Hoekstra said in a post on LinkedIn.
“We will unequivocally continue to support international climate research, as the foundation of our understanding and work. We will also continue to work on international climate cooperation.”
Trump, who has thrown the full weight of his domestic policy behind fossil fuels, has openly scorned the scientific consensus that human activity is warming the planet, deriding climate science as a “hoax.”
His administration sent no representative to the most recent UN climate summit in Brazil in November, which is held every year under the auspices of the UNFCCC.
Teresa Ribera, the EU’s vice-president for the clean transition, said the Trump administration “doesn’t care” about the environment, health or the suffering of people.
Fight Looms
The UNFCCC was adopted at the Rio Earth Summit in June 1992 and approved later that year by the US Senate during George H.W. Bush’s presidency.
“The US withdrawal from the UN climate framework is a heavy blow to global climate action, fracturing hard-won consensus,” Li Shuo, a climate expert at the Asia Society Policy Institute, told our correspondent.
The US Constitution allows presidents to enter treaties “provided two-thirds of Senators present concur,” but it is silent on the process for withdrawing from them — a legal ambiguity that could invite court challenges.
Trump has already withdrawn from the landmark Paris climate accord since returning to office, just as he did during his first term from 2017–2021 in a move later reversed by his successor, Democratic president Joe Biden.
Exiting the underlying treaty could introduce additional legal uncertainty around any future US effort to rejoin.
Jean Su, a senior attorney for the nonprofit Center for Biological Diversity, told our correspondent: “Pulling out of the UNFCCC is a whole order of magnitude different from pulling out of the Paris Agreement.”
“It’s our contention that it’s illegal for the President to unilaterally pull out of a treaty that required two-thirds of the Senate vote,” she continued.
“We are looking at legal options to pursue that line of argument.”
Progressive Ideology
California Governor Gavin Newsom, an outspoken critic of Trump who is widely seen as a presidential contender, said in a statement, “our brainless president is surrendering America’s leadership on the world stage and weakening our ability to compete in the economy of the future — creating a leadership vacuum that China is already exploiting.”
The memo also directs the United States to withdraw from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the UN body responsible for assessing climate science, alongside other climate-related organizations including the International Renewable Energy Agency, UN Oceans and UN Water.
As in his first term, Trump has also withdrawn the United States from UNESCO — the UN Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization — which Washington had rejoined under Biden.
Trump has likewise pulled the US out of the World Health Organisation and sharply reduced foreign aid.
Other prominent bodies named in the memo include the UN Population Fund (UNFPA), UN Women, and the UN Conference on Trade and Development (UNCTAD).
Secretary of State Marco Rubio said in a statement the organisations were driven by “progressive ideology” and were actively seeking to “constrain American sovereignty.”
“From DEI (Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion) mandates to ‘gender equity’ campaigns to climate orthodoxy, many international organizations now serve a globalist project,” he said.
See Full List:
UN ORGANISATIONS
Department of Economic and Social Affairs
UN Economic and Social Council (ECOSOC) — Economic Commission for Africa
Economic Commission for Latin America and the Caribbean
Economic and Social Commission for Asia and the Pacific
Economic and Social Commission for Western Asia
International Law Commission
International Residual Mechanism for Criminal Tribunals
International Trade Centre
Office of the Special Adviser on Africa
Office of the Special Representative of the Secretary General for Children in Armed Conflict
Office of the Special Representative of the Secretary-General on Sexual Violence in Conflict
Office of the Special Representative of the Secretary-General on Violence Against Children
Peacebuilding Commission
Peacebuilding Fund
Permanent Forum on People of African Descent
UN Alliance of Civilizations
UN Collaborative Programme on Reducing Emissions from Deforestation and Forest Degradation in Developing Countries
UN Conference on Trade and Development
UN Democracy Fund
UN Energy
UN Entity for Gender Equality and the Empowerment of Women
UN Framework Convention on Climate Change
UN Human Settlements Programme
UN Institute for Training and Research
UN Oceans
UN Population Fund
UN Register of Conventional Arms
UN System Chief Executives Board for Coordination
UN System Staff College
UN Water
UN University
NON-UN ORGANISATIONS
24/7 Carbon-Free Energy Compact
Colombo Plan Council
Commission for Environmental Cooperation
Education Cannot Wait
European Centre of Excellence for Countering
Forum of European National Highway Research Laboratories
Freedom Online Coalition
Global Community Engagement and Resilience Fund
Global Counterterrorism Forum
Global Forum on Cyber Expertise
Global Forum on Migration and Development
Inter-American Institute for Global Change Research
Intergovernmental Forum on Mining, Minerals, Metals, and Sustainable Development
Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change
Intergovernmental Science-Policy Platform on Biodiversity and Ecosystem Services
International Centre for the Study of the Preservation and Restoration of Cultural Property
International Cotton Advisory Committee
International Development Law Organization
International Energy Forum
International Federation of Arts Councils and Culture Agencies
International Institute for Democracy and Electoral Assistance
International Institute for Justice and the Rule of Law
International Lead and Zinc Study Group
International Renewable Energy Agency
International Solar Alliance
International Tropical Timber Organization
International Union for Conservation of Nature
Pan American Institute of Geography and History
Partnership for Atlantic Cooperation
Regional Cooperation Agreement on Combatting Piracy and Armed Robbery against Ships in Asia
Regional Cooperation Council
Renewable Energy Policy Network for the 21st Century
Science and Technology Center in Ukraine
Secretariat of the Pacific Regional Environment Programme
Venice Commission of the Council of Europe.
