Begun at the European Court of human rights in strasburg. Young activists are taking on powerful governments over their alleged inaction action against Climate Change. The courts rulings are legally binding on member countries. The legal route seems to be increasingly popular among activists and young people are increasingly at the forefront of activism. Could an approach based on child rights be the way forward in tackling Global Warming . We have a lot to discuss. It is six youths versus 32 countries. They argue governments are not doing enough to stop Global Warming and their inaction poses a risk to their health and lives. They are aged between 11 and 24 and made their way to the European Court of human rights to argue their case. With the support of other climate activists. We are the six representing a generation, the voices of the generation that wants to live a life that is good for everyone. They come from areas in portugal ravaged by wildfires and heat waves. They filed the case three years after a series of forest fires in 2017 killed 66 people. They say they are suffering from anxiety over the natural disasters. It affects their physical and mental health, their civil corp. , political, and social rights, as well as their dignity. It is crucial to adopt a child rights based approach to the question of Climate Change and how it affects their human rights. 27 e. U. Member states as well as others are being sued, making it the largest ever climate case to be heard by a court in strasburg. More than 18 lawyers represent the states. Russia is not represented. They say governments understand the threat of Climate Change. Outside the courtroom, they say all the right things about Climate Emergency but today, they are denying the reality that what we are experiencing is getting worse and worse. To the extreme heat, i am limited in how i exercise and how much time i can spend outdoors. I am forced to stay inside. I struggle to sleep some nights because of the heat and thanks to the weak Climate Policies countries are taking, but i remain hopeful that the court will understand the urgency of this situation and will decide in favor of our case. Last month, bencic in the u. S. State of montana handed an historic victory to young activists in a case involving Climate Change and in europe, the European Court of human rights has two more pending. A decision in this case is not expected for several months. With increasing wildfires and he waves becoming more frequent, climate lawsuits brought on by youths could become a trend in europe and beyond. Inside story. Lets go ahead and bring in our guests. Joining us in paris, catherine, head of Climate Change Adaptation Program at the organisation for Economic Cooperation and development. In london, the director of Climate Justice at oxfam u. S. A warm welcome to you both and thank you so much for joining us today. Let me start with you today. This is a landmark case, the largest ever climate case to be heard by the European Court of human rights. From your vantage point, how significant is it . It is very significant, the first case before the European Court of human rights on Climate Change and it is the first and so far only that targets 32 Different Countries that are members of the council of europe. So it raises a whole number of very interesting and broad questions and also because it is against so many countries, if the court rules for the plaintiff, it could have a pretty Significant Impact on the world as a whole. You mentioned that this raises some pretty interesting legal points Going Forward. What are some of those you consider to be the more interesting legal arguments being made in this case . Sure, the most challenging one legally is that the people the children who brought they were children when they brought the complaint are making claims against 32 Different Countries for their separate actions that are having an impact on them. Normally, the court, when it rules normally, it rules on impacts that a state has on people within its direct control. And so, the issue of Climate Change shows how to properly respect human rights, the court cannot simply hold that rights stop at borders because emissions do not stop at borders. Go ahead. Sorry. If a court rules correctly, it will hold all these countries liable because all of them are causing the impact that is affecting the plaintiffs. I saw you reacting a lot to what he was saying and it looks like he wanted to jump in so please go ahead. From our perspective, i think it is striking to see that it is a crossborder issue but the impact of Climate Change this is how much i gathered from the news thus far is that they are very much constructing the case on the basis of the impacts that they are feeling in their own countries such as portugal, as they were describing, the Health Impacts of wildfires and extreme heat that they have been suffering over the last few years. Let me ask you about the fact that this summer was the hottest on record. This case is arguing that young people in particular face of future of hardship because countries are simply not doing enough to combat Climate Change. From your vantage point, are the countries that are named in this lawsuit, based on what you have seen, actually preparing to face the effects of Climate Change . Very slowly so. Each time, unfortunately, it takes an extreme event to get a little bit of progress in terms of legislation, in terms of actual investments of adapting to Climate Change. It is nowhere near as much as we would have to do in order to keep the levels of lives, the levels of suffering that we are having today, to keep that constant in the future. There is a large amount of investment that is needed and what climate researchers and experts argue all the time, that it is a fraction of the cost you would need to actually adapt to Climate Change now so it is easy, so to speak, to protect our lives, at least in the next few decades. Not in the long run. Without climate mitigation, we are not going anywhere but in the short run, it will cost a lot less to adapt as opposed to each time letting these extreme events happen. We are not seeing that countries are making sufficient progress even in the face of the images that we are seeing across the world. One of the core arguments in this case is that this is causing a lot of anxiety and distress for young people. They are not just talking about the physical health here when it comes to Climate Change and the impact that it is having on health. They are also talking about mental health. How does that differentiate this case from other cases in the past . There is a long history of looking at cruel and degrading punishment, not only the mental aspects not only the physical aspects but also the mental aspects so in that sense, they are simply applying that same logic to Climate Change that has been applied in human rights cases previously addressed by the court so it is quite logical for them to apply it. I mean, the impacts are just horrendous and one thing really, i mean, of course, this is a case about impacts in portugal but if the case is successful, it will have impacts on places where the impacts are so much worse. We saw the drought in Eastern Africa which was, you know, 99 or even 100 caused by Climate Change. And they are, you have i mean, it is staggering, the amount of impacts on peoples lives, health, survival. You mentioned that the youth who brought this case come from parts of portugal that have been ravaged by heat waves. They filed this three years after a series of forest fires killed dozens of people. They say they are suffering from severe anxiety because of all of this. They say they are representing an entire generation. This really puts into stark relief how existential this issue is for them. I want to ask you if you think this is the kind of case that has the potential to connect with the public more because of that . I think, you know, i think that is actually one of the reasons why this you know, the people who brought this case, you know, did so. It really brings out that element of the lack of fairness towards the younger generations, the lack of intergenerational justice. The people making these decisions are really not the people who are mostly going to be affected by it. It is the younger generations in the future generations. We are headed towards a world of three degrees warming by 2100 and some of the plaintiffs who brought this, the youngest ones will still be alive and will face that and smell it and taste it. We know that the occurrence of extreme wildfires is growing with unprecedented damages and so many countries around the world and this case is highlighting that to a certain degree. I want to talk to you about some of the research that you have done when it comes to the growing occurrences of wildfires, how that is impacting communities, how much damage is being caused as a result. Thanks for that question. Wildfires are an issue that we have observed across all different biomes in the world. You have had wildfires in indonesia that are indirect consequences of respiratory degrees is killed above 100,000 people while in oecd countries, richer countries, you might not hear so much about lives lost. You still see some victims who actually lose their lives but nevertheless, the indirect impact in terms of health are virtually the same. The wildfires in canada, for example, all of northern america u. S. , including new york city under and other of air quality and we will only see the results exposed of how much respiratory distress we suffered and how much in excess fatality rates we can observe in that very instant but the consequences, they trickle down join or mislead. The very direct impacts suffered by the community, for obvious reasons in terms of their own personal assets but also in terms of their sources of income. But then they trickle through the entire economy as we have seen in portugal or also in canada where you see percentage drops in gdp outputs where these extreme events happen. For example, the bushfires, the 2018 campfires in california, they produced the damages we estimate at around 20 billion u. S. Dollars which is completely unheard of for extreme events of wildfires. These are numbers we have heard before where we talk about extreme flood events similar to what we have seen recently but never for wildfires. Pick your climate related extreme event or even the slower onset ones, droughts. They caused a tremendous amount of economic damage and hardship as we just heard, especially in the southern hemisphere. If we can take another step back for a moment, i am curious to know your thoughts on if you believe that countries, if their policies and practices are actually evolving in the face of this increased risk from wildfires. I mean, are we seeing countries actually scale up . Oftentimes, when these disasters occur, it looks as though countries are being more reactive and have not really been proactive in trying to combat this in a different way. Of svitolina and the dynamics are unfortunately still the same. I have been working on this topic for the better half of the last two decades. The dynamics are still the same so if you look at spending or just pick one example, wildfires, and pick the spending Public Expenditure for wildfire suppression in the last 40 years, if you look at the united states, for example, or portugal, spending has increased 20 fold which correlates perfectly well with the sizes of wildfires and the frequency we are seeing, but if you then look into actual spending on preventing those wildfires, and by all means, we know how to prevent disasters. We know how to adapt to them in a better way, the slow onset ones as well as the sudden onset ones, we know what we can do. We can manage our forests better, plan our urban environments better rise to reduce the wild and urban interface. We know a lot of what we can do to reduce the urban heat island effect which is dramatic in European Countries as well as yet we do not do any of that. We always wait until an extreme event happens and that is where we then put the money. Is this efficiently spent . Not at all. We cannot even show the costbenefit ratios and then comparing them to what would happen and yet what we are achieving what countries are doing, if you pointed to that already in the climate targets we are discussing here on mitigation, more and more, we are introducing stringent adaptation targets as well. I would interpret that as a step in the right direction but it is very slow progress. I want to ask you your thoughts on some of the key arguments on both sides of this case. First, i want to ask you about an argument from the plaintiff side. One of the key accusations from the plaintiffs is that the fundamental human rights of people are being infringed upon because the countries in question have failed to adequately reduce human caused warming. How strong of a legal argument is that from your perspective . A strong argument because they can show a direct line between the failures of these governments to reduce emissions and the impacts on lives, of course, the lives of many others. That is the climate science. It has become so clear that it just cannot be questioned. I think the challenge coming to the government side would be, well, you know, it is for governments to decide the types of policies that should be adopted to address that. The thing is the governments are not i mean, there is a whole range of measures, different policy measures that could be taken to reduce emissions. There is not necessarily one single way to get there. There are different ways to get there but they are not getting to the result. We are headed to a world of warming of about 2. 7 degrees. Governments have said that their target is 1. 5 and that, by the way, is actually not a target based on human rights standards. We are seeing vast violations of peoples human rights through housing, shelter, on the current warming which is about 1. 2 degrees. So the governments are not setting the right target. They are sitting 1. 5 to two which is itself inefficient, and they are not even meeting that. Their own plans, if you read them, show that they are insufficient. So they are not meeting those targets, and really, governments should be doing all that is in their power. That is a standard. Are they doing all that is in their power to prevent the harm to humanoids . Look at any governments. They are not mobilizing the millions the billions that are needed to shift us to renewable energy. They are not insulating homes, not switching from gas to heat pumps. They are not putting taxes on private jets, suvs, a whole range of things. It is really there policies are almost based on magical reality that somehow, we will encourage renewable energy, put in some inadequate Carbon Pricing and offsets and that will result that will resolve the problem and it will not. Any serious scientist or policymaker will show measures are insufficient and they are really has measures. Let me get back to you with regards to the arguments being made by european government lawyers. I did see her reacting to some of what you were saying. It looked to me like he wanted to add to the point that he was making so please go ahead. Just to that yes, it is true, the measures currently taken could perhaps be quite a bit stronger and i think if you look at sort of multilateralism in that space is also taking a hit because they are such hardfought negotiations and countries are very heterogeneous in their positions but we are making progress, especially in highly developed countries. Emissions have been going down and what we are trying to tell our countries as we support them in their policy progress is we need to tell the good stories and the opportunities that lie behind engaging in fighting Climate Change and as much as i work on adaptation and as much as to put the impacts to the fine measures of how we can protect our communities from these impacts, i think it is also important that we find positive stories. We have been hearing a lot about it this year that actually contributed to reaching some of what we call climate Tipping Points and you will see that as our colleagues just said, 1. 5 is not enough to avoid us triggering these climate Tipping Points and while we can only tell whether this was actually Tipping Point later, a lot of what we have seen in terms of impact is pointing to that it was actually a Tipping Point year. Just a half degree warming. These two points will be triggered a lot more in the future. What we are trying to tell countries or what we are trying to get there thinking hats on is to say what are the positive Tipping Points in society . How can we turn the tide in favor of transformative action in policymaking . This is quite an important story to tell as well as opportunities lying in wait that we manage these transitions Going Forward. Let me get back to you about the arguments in this particular case. European government lawyers say they accept the impact of Climate Change but that these cases should be heard in National Courts first. Their argument is one based on jurisdiction. What do you say to that . The issue with that is that the challenge is not national. In a national court, it will be easier to hold the government to account for the impacts on the people within that territory. For example, germany has had litigation in the courts about the impacts on german young people but the court said that we are not looking at the impacts on people outside, so it would be deeply problematic of german policy, decisions are made purely on the basis of impacts on germans because the impacts vary between countries. The impacts are worse in countries that are, you know, more vulnerable to the impacts of Climate Change. So yes, that would be problematic to deal with these things nationally rather than recognize them for the transboundary situations that they actually are. Catherine, last month, a judge in the u. S. State of montana handed an historic victory to young activists in a case involving Climate Change. In europe, at the European Court of human rights, there are two more climate cases that are now pending. The fact that there are these two other cases pending at the European Court of human rights and the fact that there was this victory in montana, do you think that you are going to see more of these types of lawsuits being brought Going Forward . It certainly shows that Climate Change is altering peoples lives directly or indirectly in the form of climate anxiety, in the form of expected future opportunities as well. This is what they are clearly showing, but we have seen these litigations as well on the adaptation side. Litigations against local authorities, local responsible actors such as mayors that failed to protect people against heavy stones, floods, and why do we see these litigations . It is an attempt in an environment where a lot of the policies that we are working on are not necessarily mandatory, not necessarily policies that federal governments, central governments can mandate but they can only provide guidelines. In the end, a lot of that is at other levels of government and in a very desperate attempt to sort of told everybody to account and hold actors responsible for their doings, we see these litigations. I think their importance, symbolically speaking, should not be underestimated. I think more Climate Change will impact lives of communities around the world, the more we see such litigation processes happening. Rulings are legally binding for Member States but do you see complications Going Forward as far as implementation if the plaintiff were to be successful in this case and if that ruling were to be legally binding, how easy would it be to implement . Well, i mean, the level of implementation of their judgments varies. I would say that most of the countries in question would implement the decision. They may take their time about it. Generally, the history is where a ruling is very clear, like compensation, for example, that is normally non, but where it requires strong come along programmatic change, sometimes, that does take a while and some governments dragged their feet. The Czech Republic and its decisions that have been imposed on it on nondiscrimination against roma communities, lots of footage dragging there. There are mechanisms by which ministers, the council of europe can hold states to account for implementation. Of course, when there is a clear judgment, it makes it much easier for the governments to be held accountable by civil society. Let me ask you, and please, just be mindful of the fact that we have about 1. 5 minutes left. Do you think that if this case is successful Going Forward that a specific mechanism that would need to be created to be put in place in order to ensure that enforcement was actually effective . I think enforcement in general of all the Climate Policies that we are working on is helpful because we see that where you cannot hold anyone to account, progress has been very slow and limited so whatever it means, help us getting there to make sure the targets we are setting we know what targets we need to reach to avoid a five degrees warming scenario. We know what measures to take on the mitigation side and adaptation side though what is often really lacking is we actually enforce these policies and hold everyone who is responsible in society it is not just governments, to account of what we are doing, it would be helpful so anything that can help us get to where we need to go i think is very welcome. We have run out of time so we are going to have to leave the conversation. Thank you so much to our guests. And thank you for watching. You can see the program again any time by visiting our website, al jazeera. Com, and for further discussion, go to our facebook page. You can also join the conversation on x. For me and the whole team here, goodbye for now
vimarsana.com © 2020. All Rights Reserved.