Environment ministers from across the EU agreed to ratify a landmark UN climate accord on Friday.<br /><br /> The agreement to cut greenhouse gas emissions was struck in Paris in December.<br /><br /> It needs at least 55 countries representing at least 55% of emissions to ratify it before the pact can enter into force.<br /><br /> The US and China, which are the world’s two largest emitters of greenhouse gases, have already ratified the agreement.<br /><br /> The EU’s move means that it will likely enter into force by the end of the year.<br /><br /> “Our reputation was on the line,” said Miguel Arias Canete, the EU Commissioner for Climate Change. <br /><br /> “They said that Europe is too complicated to agree quickly. They said we had too many obstacles, they said we were all talk.”<br /><br /> Countries that signed up have agreed to cut greenhouse gases and keep the rise in global temperatures below 2 degrees Celsius, compared with pre industrial levels.<br /><br /> The Paris Agreement will eventually replace the Kyoto Protocol, which was brokered in 1997.<br />
