At international level, human rights have become an important issue in climate change negotiations. This is what the report published on Monday 27 March by the main European coalition of NGOs fighting climate change, Climate Action Network (CAN) Europe, has shown.
In a paper entitled “Using human rights as a weapon to hold governments and corporations accountable on climate change”, CAN Europe outlines the main improvements resulting from citizens’ actions against states or companies accused of contributing to global warming. In total, almost 500 climate cases were brought to court worldwide between 2020 and 2021.
According to Romain Didi, CAN Europe’s expert in climate governance and human rights policy, “this report illustrates the natural trend of using human rights to fight dangerous climate change via the courts, as this connection was recognised in the Paris Agreement and more recently in the Glasgow Climate Pact”.
The publication, aimed at a “non-specialist” audience, comes ahead of a hearing by the European Court of Human Rights to assess the extent to which a nation should reduce its greenhouse gas emissions to protect its own population on 29 March.
To read the report: https://aeur.eu/f/62k (Original version in French by Nithya Paquiry)