At the G8 summit, world leaders announced earlier today they would work toward cutting carbon emissions by at least 50 percent by 2050. The Canadian government described the deal as major progress, but environmental campaigners slammed the world’s wealthiest nations for not doing more to fight global warming. Oxfam said the G8 climate agreement threatened the world’s poor. Oxfam spokesperson Antonio Hill said, “Rather than a breakthrough, the G8’s announcement on 2050 is another stalling tactic that does nothing to lower the risk faced by millions of poor people right now.” On Monday, UN Secretary-General Ban Ki-moon described climate change as one of the major issues facing the world.

Ban Ki-moon: “The world faces three simultaneous crises: a food crisis, a climate crisis and a development crisis. The three crises are deeply interconnected and need to be addressed as such.”