In a 55-minute speech on Tuesday that defied the very mission of the United Nations itself, US President Donald Trump called global warming “a con job”, European policies on clean energy “suicidal”, and accused the UN of offering little more than “empty words”.

The remarks were Trump’s first of his second term in office, and much of it focused on brandishing his domestic achievements and deriding the UN and other countries’ policies on immigration, peacemaking, climate change and multilateralism.

The president said his country was now in a “golden age”, and imparted lessons to “the free world”: close your borders, and return to traditional energy sources. “Your countries are going to hell,” he said.