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Six young people from areas in Portugal ravaged by wildfires and heatwaves will on Wednesday take 32 European governments to court over what they see as climate inaction, arguing countries’ failure to cut emissions fast enough is a violation of their human rights.
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The case – filed in September 2020 against the 27 EU member states as well Britain, Switzerland, Norway, Russia and Turkey – is the largest-ever climate case to be heard by the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) in Strasbourg.
With the support of the British-based Global Legal Action Network (GLAN), the Portuguese applicants, aged between 11 and 24, are seeking a legally-binding decision that would force states to act.
A ruling in the case is expected in the first half of 2024. If the complaint is upheld, it could result in orders from national courts for governments to cut carbon dioxide emissions blamed for climate change faster than currently planned.
Gerry Liston, one of GLAN’s lawyers, said that if the case was successful it would be up to national courts to enforce the rulings and that they would be provided with a roadmap to ensure enforcement was effective.
Applicants will argue climate change threatens their rights including to life, physical and mental wellbeing.
One of the six, 15-year-old Andre Oliveira, previously told Reuters their goal was to force governments to “do what they promised they would do”, referring to the 2015 Paris Agreement to cut emissions to limit global warming to 2 degrees Celsius and ideally 1.5C. Current policies would fail to meet either goal, according to the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
“Without urgent action to cut emissions, (the place) where I live will soon become an unbearable furnace,” another applicant, 20-year-old Martim Agostinho, said in a statement.
Agostinho and three other…
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