United Nations Secretary General Ban Ki-moon urged China, one of the world's top two emitters of greenhouse gases, to become a global leader in the battle against global warming, the Associated Press reported on Friday.

Ban Ki-moon pressed China to foster sustainable and low-emissions economic development to stave off climate change.

Without China, there can be no success this year on a new global climate framework, Ban said at The Green Lights Project in Beijing.

China's president Hu Jintao agreed to exchange his views on the issue with Ban, according to the agency.

China and the U.S. are responsible for 40 percent of the world's emissions of carbon dioxide which the Environmental Protection Agency has linked to global warming.