France is to stop granting new licences for oil and gas exploration on the mainland and in overseas territories, Environment Minister Nicolas Hulot said Friday.

Scientists studying global warming recently climbed Bolivia's towering Mount Illimani and extracted samples of glacier ice packed with thousands of years of climate data.

The international ICE Memory project team braved low oxygen and bitter, ice-cold wind that whipped them mercilessly at an altitude of 6,300 meters to drill deep into the glacier and pull out two cylinders of ice.

In the azure waters of the Red Sea, Maoz Fine and his team dive to study what may be the planet's most unique coral: one that can survive global warming, at least for now.

The corals, striking in their red, orange and green colours, grow on tables some eight metres (26 feet) underwater, put there by the Israeli scientists to unlock their secrets to survival.

Coral reef bleaching may be easing after three years of high ocean temperatures, the longest such period since the 1980s, the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration said Monday.

The European Union on Monday blasted U.S. President Donald Trump for pulling out of the Paris climate change pact and said Brussels would continue to lead efforts to prevent global warming.

France has made good on its promise to invite foreign climate change experts to the country, pledging 30 million euros to fund the work of up to 50 researchers. 

Cool, high-lying areas of Ethiopia hitherto shielded from heat-loving malaria mosquitoes are increasingly exposed to the disease as the climate warms, researchers said Thursday.

U.S. President Donald Trump is "standing on the wrong side of history" after pulling out from the Paris climate accord, former U.N. secretary general Ban Ki-moon said Wednesday.

U.S. President Donald Trump was "wrong" to pull the United States out of the Paris climate change deal, Britain's new environment minister said on Tuesday.

France said Monday that the global fight against climate change was irreversible and could even be accelerated, despite Donald Trump's decision to pull the United States out of the Paris accord on carbon emissions.