OTTAWA, Dec. 13 (UPI) -- Canada is coming under fire from a number of countries for its withdrawal from the Kyoto Protocol on climate change.
The withdrawal, which is legal and was expected, makes Canada the first nation to pull out of the global treaty. Peter Kent, minister of the environment, said the protocol "does not represent a way forward" for Canada.
The move was "bad news for the fight against climate change," a French foreign ministry spokesman said. A spokesman for China's foreign ministry said the decision was "regrettable and [it] flies in the face of the efforts of the international community," the BBC reported Tuesday.
The protocol, adopted in Kyoto, Japan, in 1997, targeted global warming as countries agreed to take voluntary but non-binding steps to reduce their carbon emissions.
Japan's environment minister, Goshi Hosono, urged Canada to stay in the protocol.
Kent said meeting Canada's obligations under Kyoto would cost $13.6 billion.
There was support for Canada's decision from Australia's Minister of Climate Change Greg Combet.
"The Canadian decision to withdraw from the protocol should not be used to suggest Canada does not intend to play its part in global efforts to tackle climate change," a spokesman for the minister told The Sydney Morning Herald.
