The highest court of the United Nations (UN) highlighted on Wednesday “the urgent and existential threat represented by climate change” by starting reading an opinion on state legal obligations to take action.
The non -binding opinion of the International Court of Justice, also known as the world court, will probably determine the course of future climate actions around the world.
“Greenhouse gas emissions are unequivocally caused by human activities that are not territorially limited,” said Judge Yuji Iwasawa. Reading the opinion was underway and the court had not yet announced its conclusions.
Before the decision, climate action advocates gathered outside the court, singing, “What do we want? Climate justice! When do we want this? Now!”
Although not binding, the deliberation of the 15 Judges of the World Court in The Hague will, however, will have legal and political weight and future climatic cases will not be able to ignore it, the legal experts say.
“It is so important that it can be one of the most consequent legal decisions of our time, due to the scope of the issues it addresses, which are at the heart of climate justice,” said Joie Chowdhury, senior lawyer for the International Environmental Law.
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The two questions that the UN General Assembly asked judges to consider were: what are the obligations of countries according to international law to protect the climate from greenhouse gas emissions; And what are the legal consequences for countries that harm the climate system?
In two weeks of hearings in December last year at the World Court, the rich global countries told judges that existing climate treaties, including the 2015 Paris Agreement, which are largely non -binding, should be the basis for deciding their responsibilities.
Developing countries and small island states have argued in favor of stronger measures, in some cases legally binding, to reduce emissions and for the largest greenhouse gas emitters, which cause climate warming, provide financial aid.
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The activists say that the opinion of Wednesday’s court should be a point of inflection, even if the decision itself is consultative.
The decision could also make it easier for states to blame other states for climate reasons such as pollution or emissions.
