Climate protection is now a human right.

GLOBAL ENVIRONMENTINTERNATIONAL LAW AND HUMANITARIAN AFFAIRS2024

11 Apr

Written By Nicolas De Santis

Key Updates

Historic legal ruling linking climate change to human rights could be a game changer in climate-related litigation.
The court found a violation of article 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights - the right to private and family life.

By GLOGO® Editorial Team.
Updated 9 min ago.

26th April 2024

HERE’S WHAT TO KNOW

Our planet is our home, and it is being destroyed and depleted by our own unlimited overconsumption. Unless we change the current paradigm, the future generations will inherit a wasteland. This historic legal ruling makes a clean and safe environment a human right.

BASIS FOR ISSUING THE GLOBAL GOVERNANCE ALERT

On 9 April 2024, the European Court of Human Rights delivered a groundbreaking ruling: states are obliged to protect their citizens from the threats and harms of climate change.

According to Ruth Delbaere, a legal specialist at Avaaz, a U.S.-based nonprofit that promotes climate activism, the verdict will serve as a "blueprint for how to successfully sue your government over climate failures. " This landmark ruling is the first time an international human-rights court has linked protection of human rights with duties to mitigate global warming, underscoring that climate law and policy do not operate in a human-rights vacuum. The ruling is set to reshape climate protection worldwide.

More than 2,500 Swiss women aged 64 or over brought a case claiming that Switzerland was doing too little to reduce its greenhouse gas emissions and contribute to meeting the 2015 Paris Agreement targets. The court agreed.