UN Child Rights Committee Rules That Countries Bear Cross-Border Responsibility For Harmful Impact Of Climate Change
A historic ruling regarding the harmful effects of climate change on children's rights has been delivered in Geneva where the Child Rights Committee (CRC) has determined that a State party can be held responsible for the negative impact of its carbon emissions on the rights of children both within and outside its territory.
The Committee examined a petition filed by 16 children from 12 countries against Argentina, Brazil, France, Germany and Turkey in 2019. In the petition, the children claimed that these five countries had failed to take preventative measures against emissions and that this was repugnant to the children's rights to life, health, and culture. In setting out their argument, the children pointed out that the climate crisis is not an "abstract future threat and that the 1.1°C increase in global average temperature since pre-industrial times has already caused devastating heat waves, fostering the spread of infectious diseases, forest fires, extreme weather patterns, floods, and sea-level rise". As children, they claimed, they were among the most affected by these life-threatening impacts, both mentally and physically.
In its ruling, the Committee, having held five oral hearings with the children’s legal representatives, the States’ representatives and third party interveners between May and September 2021, along with the children themselves, held that the States concerned exercised jurisdiction over those children.
Committee member Ann Skelton stated "Emitting States are responsible for the negative impact of the emissions originating in their territory on the rights of children – even those children who may be located abroad. The collective nature of the causes of climate change must not absolve a State from its individual responsibility. ... It is a matter of sufficiently proving that there is a causal link between the harm and the States’ acts or omissions”.
The Committee concluded that a sufficient causal link had been established between the harm alleged by the 16 children and the acts or omissions of the five States for the purposes of establishing jurisdiction, and that the children had sufficiently justified that the harm that they had personally suffered was significant.
The Committee did not go so far as to determine whether the States concerned were in breach of their obligations under the Convention on the Rights of the Child, as this issue had not been brought before the national courts prior to coming before the Committee.
The full decision can be accessed here (see consideration of individual complaints)