The International Court of Justice (ICJ) has just completed hearings on the climate crisis in a case that could have critical consequences for the survival of future generations. From December 2-13, more than 100 states and organizations argued before the ICJ in landmark litigation that began five years ago when Pacific Islander law students initiated a grassroots movement that persuaded the UN General Assembly to request an advisory opinion from the ICJ.
“In The Hague, most of which lies below sea level, this has been a momentous two weeks,” environmental attorney Richard Harvey, who works for Greenpeace International and attended the historic proceedings, told Truthout. “The Cold War divided the world into East and West but climate change divides it into North and South: corporate petrostates against the Small Island Developing States and the rest.”
“Never before have the U.S., Russia, China, U.K., Saudi Arabia, Kuwait and OPEC [the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries] lined up so explicitly against those who suffer the most from their greed,” Harvey said. “Corporate petrostates shamelessly asserted that peoples’ rights to self-determination, to life and to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment are, in essence, trumped by their right to fossil fuel profits.”
On March 29, 2023, the General Assembly adopted Resolution 77/276 that recognized “climate change is an unprecedented challenge of civilizational proportions and that the well-being of present and future generations of humankind depends on our immediate and urgent response to it.” The resolution directed the ICJ to render an advisory opinion on:
The campaign in the General Assembly was spearheaded by Vanuatu, a constellation of 83 small islands in the South Pacific and one of the states most vulnerable to climate change. The measure that was introduced by Vanuatu and co-sponsored by over 130 states took aim at the primary emitters of fossil fuels, of which the United States is the leading culprit.
“Today, we find ourselves on the frontlines of a crisis we did not create ⎯ a crisis that threatens our very existence and that of so many other peoples who have come in unprecedented numbers to be heard by this Court,” Ralph Regenvanu, Vanuatu’s special envoy for climate change and environment, told the 15 judges. “The outcome of these proceedings will reverberate across generations, determining the fate of nations like mine and the future of our planet.”
Many states, including Tuvalu, characterized the climate crisis as “existential.” Despite producing less than 0.01 percent of greenhouse gas emissions, Tuvalu is on a trajectory to be the first country completely lost to rising sea levels due to climate change. The Solomon Islands have already lost five islands and others face severe erosion. Several states cited extreme weather events, many quite recent, that have had disastrous consequences for their people.
“The cost of fossil fuel subsidies from States reached an all-time high of US$7 trillion in 2022,” more than 23 times the amount that developing countries strived to secure for climate finance at the recent COP29.
Elizabeth Exposto, chief of staff to the prime minister of Timor-Leste, which is acutely vulnerable to climate change, said, “The climate crisis that we face today is the result of the historical and ongoing actions of industrialised nations, which have reaped the benefits of rapid economic growth, powered by colonial exploitation and carbon-intensive industries and practices.” She also noted, “These nations, representing only a fraction of the global population, are overwhelmingly responsible for the climate crisis, and yet, the impacts of climate change do not respect borders.”
But Margaret Taylor, legal adviser to the U.S. Department of State, dismissed the idea that the worst offenders were most responsible for taking actions to remedy the harm they are causing to the developing states. She asserted that, “States’ current obligations in respect........