Photo: MOHAMED ABDEL HAMID/AFP
By Climate Home News
Leaders from a dozen climate vulnerable countries - four of them from the Pacific - have criticised "endless" climate change negotiations at the start of an unprecedented maritime court hearing in Hamburg, Germany.
According to Climate Home News, Antigua & Barbuda Prime Minister Gaston Browne told the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea (ITLOS) that it was time to speak of "legally binding obligations, rather than empty promises that go unfulfilled, abandoning peoples to suffering and destruction".
The Commission of Small Island States on Climate Change and International Law (COSIS) is made up of Antigua & Barbuda, Tuvalu, Palau, Niue, Vanuatu, Saint Lucia, Saint Vincent and the Grenadines, Saint Kitts & Nevis, and the Bahamas.
Small island states are meeting over the next fortnight in the German city to clarify state duties to protect the marine environment.
"They have asked the tribunal for its formal opinion on state responsibilities on climate change under the UN maritime treaty that it is responsible for upholding - the 1982 UN Convention on the Law of the Sea," Climate Home News reported.
"The group of small islands wants the tribunal to clearly set out their legal obligations to protect the marine environment from the impacts of climate change, including ocean warming, acidification and sea level rise.
Empty promises
Tuvalu's Prime Minister Kausea Natano, speaking on the first day of hearings, said vulnerable nations had tried and failed to secure action to cut global greenhouse gas emissions during years of international climate talks.
"We did not see the far-reaching measures that are necessary if we are to avert catastrophe," Natano said.
"This lack of political will endangers all of humankind, and it is unacceptable for small island states like my own, which are already teetering on the brink of extinction."
Gaston Browne told the tribunal it now had the opportunity to issue a "much-needed corrective to a process that has manifestly failed to address climate change. We cannot simply continue with endless negotiations and empty promises".
He said small island nations had come before the tribunal "in the belief that international law must play a central role in addressing the catastrophe that we witness unfolding before our eyes".
Photo: AHMAD GHARABLI/AFP
Influential opinion
COSIS members hope that a strong opinion from the tribunal will prompt governments to take tougher action on climate change. While not legally binding, the opinion could also form the basis of future lawsuits, Climate Home News reported.
"The alliance stresses that it is looking to the court to explain existing state obligations, rather than creating new laws."
ITLOS does not have as high a profile as the International Court of Justice, which earlier this year was tasked by the UN to provide an advisory opinion on climate change and human rights. Nor are there as many states under its jurisdiction; the US is notable by its absence, for example.
But the tribunal is expected to come to a conclusion much earlier - potentially within the next year. And experts say its opinion could influence that of other courts including the ICJ as well as the Inter-American Court of Human Rights, which has been asked by Chile and Colombia to provide a similar advisory opinion.
Thirty states that have signed the law of the sea, as well as the EU, submitted written statements to ITLOS before the deadline.
For the full article go to Climate Home News.