India to ratify Paris Agreement on climate change

India's prime minister said Sunday that his country will ratify the Paris Agreement on climate change early next month.

Prime Minister Narendra Modi said his government will ratify the agreement Oct. 2, coinciding with the birth anniversary of India's independence leader Mohandas Gandhi, who believed in a minimum carbon footprint. Modi made the announcement at a meeting of his Bharatiya Janata Party's leaders in the southern Indian town of Kozhikode.

Historic pact to slow global warming is celebrated in Paris

Nearly 200 nations adopted the first global pact to fight climate change on Saturday, calling on the world to collectively cut and then eliminate greenhouse gas pollution but imposing no sanctions on countries that don't.

The "Paris agreement" aims to keep global temperatures from rising another degree Celsius (1.8 Fahrenheit) between now and 2100, a key demand of poor countries ravaged by rising sea levels and other effects of climate change.

Commonwealth seeks legally binding climate deal in Paris

The 53-nation Commonwealth has said climate change poses an "existential threat" to some of its member states, and urged participants at the Paris climate talks to produce a legally binding agreement on cutting greenhouse gas emissions.

The Commonwealth — a grouping of Britain and many of its former colonies that is home to more than 2 billion people — includes industrialized economies such as Canada and Australia, resource-hungry India and small island states vulnerable to rising sea levels.