Top UN court in landmark ruling: insufficient climate action violate international law

This past week, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) in The Hague ruled that a “clean, healthy and sustainable environment” is a human right and that insufficient climate action violate international law.

The ICJ ruling has been hailed as “a victory for our planet” and “a watershed moment in the global environmental movement”, and is potentially a turning point in international climate law. It enshrines a sustainable environment as a human right and says that nation states are liable for all activities that harm the climate. The ruling also paves the way for states to hold each other to account at the ICJ, as well as allowing organisations and individuals to take legal action against climate harming actors in domestic courts.

States that do not live up to their climate commitments can consequently now be guilty of violating international law, and countries that have suffered damage from climate change may be entitled to compensation or reparations — either in the form of monetary compensation or by having infrastructure and ecosystems damaged by climate change rebuilt and restored.

While the ICJ ruling is mainly about state’s obligations to limit climate change, the court did specifically target the fossil fuel industry in its ruling. The court ruled that states are legally liable to also limit the quantity of emissions that contribute to climate change from private actors within its borders and jurisdiction. If states fail “to exercise due diligence by not taking the necessary regulatory and legislative measures” to limit emissions from the private sector, they could be held responsible, the court concluded.

“The close relationship between human beings and the environment was recognized in 1968 in General Assembly resolution 2398 and in 1972 in the Stockholm Declaration. […] Moreover, Principle 1 of the Rio Declaration stated that “human beings … are entitled to a healthy and productive life in harmony with nature”. In 1994, the Commission on Human Rights recognized the link between environmental degradation and human rights. The Court recalls that human rights have been recognized to be indivisible, interdependent and interrelated. The Court thus considers that the effective enjoyment of a number of human rights cannot be fully realized if those who hold them are unable to live in a clean, healthy and sustainable environment.

[…] Failure of a State to take appropriate action to protect the climate system from GHG emissions — including through fossil fuel production, fossil fuel consumption, the granting of fossil fuel exploration licences or the provision of fossil fuel subsidies — may constitute an internationally wrongful act which is attributable to that State.”

The more than 500 pages long “advisory opinion” was produced by the ICJ after the court was instructed to do so by the UN in 2023 — following years of campaigning by a group of young Pacific island law students and diplomatic efforts by the Pacific island nation of Vanuatu. While these advisory opinions are legally non-binding, they are considered authoritative because they interpret already existing law. Thus, the new ruling will most definitely be used in future legal procedures, climate litigations, and help bolster weaker states in climate negotiations. Vanuatu’s climate change minister, Ralph Regenvanu, has already said that the ruling will give Pacific island nations “much greater leverage” at climate talks.

International organisations can help shape and interpret the rules, norms, and legal customs that encompass international law, but in the end it is nations themselves that uphold and enforce international law. And if they are unwilling or even refuse to do this — which we have seen with Israel’s horrific war crimes and genocide in Gaza — international law cannot be enforced, and it has no more meaningful value than grandiose words on a piece of paper.

Let’s hope that this truly becomes a turning point and that the current descent to “Trumpism” and fascism around the world won’t stop it from being successfully utilized to combat the climate crisis.