World facing ‘catastrophic’ temperature rises: UN

GENEVA: The world is on course for a "catastrophic" temperature rise this century, the United Nations said on Thursday as it confirmed that 2020 rivalled 2016 as the hottest year on record.

The relentless pace of climate change is destroying lives, said Secretary-General Antonio Guterres as the UN’s World Meteorological Organization said 2011-2020 had been the warmest decade recorded.

2020 "rivalled 2016 for the top spot", according to the WMO’s consolidation of five leading international datasets. The La Nina cool phase of the Pacific Ocean surface temperatures cycle "put a brake on the heat only at the very end of the year," the WMO said.

The UN weather agency said the warmest three years on record were 2016, 2019 and 2020, and the differences between them in average global temperatures were "indistinguishably small".