French FM Calls for Easier Access to Energy to Avoid More Conflicts

French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius has called for a more democratic access to energy resources as a means to step up global peace and security.

MOSCOW (Sputnik) — French Foreign Minister Laurent Fabius has called for a more democratic access to energy resources and a reduced consumption of carbon-based fuels as a means to step up global peace and security.

"This would decrease considerably the risk of fossil fuels becoming a cause of conflict in the coming decades," Fabius, who is also the president of the 2015 UN conference on climate change, wrote in a column published by the New York Times on Friday.

The French foreign minister also said that the global community should seek to reduce the exposure of people to climate damage, including protecting coastlines from rising water levels and more effective water management in dry areas.

The 21st UN Climate Change Conference is due to be held in Paris in late November and early December.

The conference, set to be attended by around 40,000 participants, will seek to forge a new international agreement to keep global warming below 2 degrees Celsius by the end of the century.