Thank you very much for the introduction of the it is really a pleasure to be with you all talking about these days.
I am honoured by the presence of people here and here in the room will be discussing it today.
That would be irreplaceable.
Julian Hoffman I don't know how many of you have read the book, but he one of those places where the meaning of loss is real visceral.
Now in the last year, I have been involved with such worlds across the globe as an English qualified barrister arguing in front of
constitutional court and the national audience on the meaning of the word meaning and the meaning of the word life.
In environmental degradation and climate change. Now, my journey has been humbling because of what I found and what those stories.
Rivers, islands, territories and peoples protecting those were our world.
Today I'm going to speak about the national courts organising climate change engagement and in particular about sort of Strait Islanders.
They get a need to do things in connection to international law and domestic law.
Number one, they don't exist in two parallel worlds.
So you will see that we make some references to the.
The point is that sometimes there is this tendency to see international law and domestic law as separate,
but rather I would point out that there is an ongoing interaction and should be a constant interaction.
We will be seeing that. Second, in connection to that,
let's not forget that domestic judgements are severely needs for that examination of rules of law as per article 38 of the ICJ statute,
which sets out where the sources is having made that point.
I like to tell you, how am I going to spend this time now in my blog I devices and professions both my way of production.
I want to contextualise stories by paid a second.
We make some preliminary remarks which I think are important to do minds so that we go into the key aspects of the case.
Probably seven. They are not all, all of them, but they are some of the key issues in the case.
And finally, I will attempt to draw some conclusions. So convex.
Can we go to the first lesson? The Torres Strait kids kind of like me explain particularly the legal issues there.
If we don't go back a bit to the genesis of that and I can tell you that the ready for the best sort of authorities case is that Sheila,
how about compare it all the United States of America.
Now, this is a case that was brought before inmate population.
All the names were individualised, so it was not the group.
Litigating was rather a human rights case before the American system.
This was filed before the Commission on Human Rights. Now pay attention to the year 2005.
The case argue, among other things, that nowhere on Earth have global warming had been a more severe impact on the person that brought the case.
Here is one of the first people to have raised climate change as a human rights issue.
In fact, she was she was nominated for an award eventually to the Nobel Peace Prize and I believe to the right level award.
Now the case what the case alleged was that global warming had already visibly formed altering land condition,
making the weather of the Arctic increasingly unpredictable,
with it being with elders who have long experience within the weather, reporting various changes, weather patterns and different areas of the ad.
It also the now decreasing water levels in lakes and rivers and producing changes in the locational characteristics and health of animal species.
Moreover, all the natural drinking water sources have become coarser, according to the complainant, and less drinkable.
And they argue that this was the result of the combined effects of the decrease in the snowfall.
Permafrost melt, the sudden early melt erosion, rising temperatures and changing winds.
Now, this case was brought in an American declaration of the rights and abuses of men.
It was needed at the outset.
So the case didn't reach any procedural stages within the commission.
It was seen by the commission before it was even raised.
Now, I read this case very attentively.
In fact, these were about the pages of extremely detailed submissions on the back of the campaign.
Now they they felt 2005.
Now you are interested. The analysis near the analysis of that,
you're invited to read a chapter I recently published in a book by Bitcoin.com called Climate Change and Global Perspectives.
Now, Sheila, when she was asked, What do you most want people to understand be the case, she said the following.
Think about the interconnectedness of the. What happens in that kind of thing?
It impacts the rest of the plans. The idea is the air conditioner for the world and it's breaking down.
Now. I think that that it's quite a monetary statement.
But I the case impacted me somehow and I analyse it for me with the idea that in the future,
should there be a case I had to get it through, I ever had to represent a case of record and opportunity arise.
I will tell you shortly. So if we go to the next place.
Now, this is not an international law case, but this case and I highlight the year 2000 and is is the next case that really grab attention.
I mean, it's a radical case in many ways. It failed originally.
It went on appeal over London's belief income is a national universal Iaw.
It is not. It is a state is it is a private party and it is ongoing.
But it has it now go on the merits. And something I want to highlight concerning this case,
we will do the next one is that here they are attempting to get liability of greenhouse gas emissions or harms arising in a different jurisdiction.
So this is a. Truly transboundary case.
So it is about an entity w e that is accused of a certain conduct.
The impact of all the harm it is happening,
it grew in the middle of them is where a glacier is melting and the claimant argues that it is melting because of the effect of climate change.
R w e is a main actor.
Now, how the courts in Germany were going to deal with that was a big question at the beginning, but they somehow have been doing it.
I know there are two main questions that they want.
They are going to determine whether a U.S.A. universe home is threatened by flooding and mudslides
as a result of the recent increase in the volume of the glacial lake located nearby and how.
rwe3 how gas emissions contributed to that risk.
They have already the courts to rule, to assess evidence, which is already,
procedurally speaking, a major step for any court to do in a case of this sort.
Next. This. Now another precedent that's, I would say,
a development that was likely to shape the thinking I heart towards this type of litigation is the Inter-American Court human rights
advisory opinion developed and I'm sorry the decree which was delivered at the end of 2017 but published on the 7th of February 2018.
Now, this is the key. This is not a conventional case.
It is rather an advisory opinion, but it's an advisory opinion that basically constitutional rights,
environmental law and human rights law for the Americas.
Now the advisory panel recognised the right to a healthy environment as a fundamental right for the existence of humanity,
something no other port had ever said. So by that point in time, and these are part of the right to life,
the court part of that has environmental degradation and the adverse effects of climate change affect the affected enjoyment of human rights,
including fundamentally the right to life. So this was a game changer, in my opinion.
I got to add substantially about this particular advisory opinion.
And so this is how we we mixed these. We get eventually to the of space.
Let me tell you a couple of things about what has happened.
In between. So so what changed from 2005 to 2003?
And most importantly, what have changed further? When I indicated together with my clients and this was in 2019 and we filed the case.
But what changed? There were two major changes. One was obviously the Paris agreement had been adopted.
Because it didn't have an enforcement mechanism.
Litigation was what's going to eventually start as a means to try to implement precise agreements.
Now the second thing that happened was that my opinion then went to sleep.
So these are the two, in my opinion, big events that took place and have made the difference between the in this case and the global.
Now. Some remarks. It wasn't a Phillips soundscape as cold as being caught in being in England.
The topic was climate change mitigation. And he advanced in particular,
a position that it was unlikely that because of a specific U.S. set of human rights boards or that oversee the implementation of the people of Sweden,
were unlikely to contribute in a material way to a broader response to climate change challenges.
And he considered at a time that only a court of general jurisdiction such as the ICJ could possibly be with an issue like climate change.
And it was obviously coming from an influential Abbotsford specialist in environmental law.
More or less what the majority probably saw.
However, I, I felt radically different.
I in a conference in 2018.
On a small estate I attended as a speaker.
And I presented the following topic on making let's see data on endangered populations the national dispute resolution for Climate Change.
Now, my key submission at the conference was that, contrary to the assumption I just told you about the possibilities of eviction,
my view was that international human rights organs not only would be adjudicating climate change claims,
but arguing that they were equipped to do so under international agreement like this.
And I gave us example of the Human Rights Committee in particular, and its potential role in interpreting the Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
I explain what manner within the party that you are attending.
There were some lawyers that when they spoke to me, they spoke to me shortly after in what became the first case,
a textbook case on climate change before the Human Rights Committee.
So the Torres Strait is a.
Belt of sea, which lies between Papua New Guinea and the north of mainland Australia to the south.
So it joins the out of policy to do with the core of the east and the region is part of the Australia, the Sea and Land Management.
The strategy describes the unique environment of the region and the culture of the people who live in that space,
as well as the history and nature of the occupation of this place.
So the my clients leave absolutely enigmatic island boy or whatever.
Now some points to bear in mind before I go in to what are the key issues in the case?
At the time that the case was filed,
I have worked at preparing the media that said there wasn't a bill pleased to do a human rights climate change case.
I have studied the EMU case and I wouldn't say I cut the cord, but basically I try to understand why this case has not worked.
What was wrong with a limitation, and where I had to strengthen a arguments in order to be successful in human rights laws.
So we didn't have also the gender Supreme Court case that you may be aware it was decided later.
Number two. This was a case of Territorian who is basically square.
He was not a case. It was not a boundary case like the union case.
This was a case where those who were alleging the calm leave in the storage to restore some of the things.
What these. Three.
This was a case that did not have permissible remedies.
So you know that there's a number of the rules of civility.
And one of them is the need for criminals.
But in his particular case, there were simply no limits sorts.
Now, that is quite a bold version. But after examining the domestic legal system in Australia,
it was clear to me that there was simply not a diplomatic source in the state and within challenge that would be
in a way admitting that there were simply no remedies in Australia for the actions of the nature we were alleging.
So that means a lot because. We basically have agreed to believe the parties and the case would progress on to the merits.
There were other types of disability issues raised by the state, but they were of a different nature, somehow mixing with the merits themselves.
Now the analysis I'm going to believe are being made from a general public international law specialist.
So I think it's quite important to remark, because what has been crucial in this litigation is not human rights specialism,
in my opinion, properly understanding how different areas of the law we can find the International Law Clinic.
So. In a landmark decision,
the Human Rights Committee found that Australia failed to adequately protect Indigenous Strait Islanders against adverse impacts of climate change.
What a breach of International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
This was in September, just in the 20 seconds. So this is a very fresh decision.
Now,
the complaint the complaint was brought by eight inhabitants of the tourism space in different islands and also some of them because of the children.
Now they belong to the Indigenous minority group of islands in Australia and they need one of their improvements.
Now they've announced that the sea level rise was causing flooding and they're
also on the of those islands and high temperature and ocean acidification
that there was a bleaching the reef there and the decline of seagrass beds and other nutritional and culturally important marine species for them.
They told me that basically they couldn't tell the systems anymore.
We are talking about people that whose lives were always punctuated by seasons.
Now this is a very similar parallel with emus that were losing the ability to predict the weather.
And they were losing their ability to move and do the things they did at certain points in time
because they couldn't recognise the lines and they weren't recognised anymore in this instance.
Now the Torres Strait Islanders argue that Australia has violated their rights under Article 67 and also 24 inches the rights of the child.
Read the law and in conjunction with the pending. Well, now they've announced that the state party has paid for other basic measures, for example,
to protect the old life way of life and culture against the effects of climate change, especially sea level rise,
and for mitigation measures to reduce greenhouse emissions and promotion of fossil fuel extraction and use,
which continues to affect the orphans and other islanders,
endangering their livelihood precisely in the violation of the rights and advocacy of the kinds.
Now, as I think was mentioned,
this was the first record brought by Climate Water that were evidence of low light islands against the silver in the bay.
And the residual had been down the ground, breaking several in several ways.
I would say that the recognition that the Holocaust indigenous peoples are among those who are extremely vulnerable,
recently experiencing severely disrupted climate change impacts.
It's already had implications from the experience of it.
So the first page recognises that actually climate change effects constitute a breach of the Covenant on Civil and Political Rights.
Now that's seven points that I want to make. The first is that the need, the failure to address climate change impacts cannot be attributable.
Post-paid has been the spend that the committee rejected.
They are the means by Australia that climate change was a global phenomenon and therefore it couldn't have responsibilities,
was attributable to the actions of all the states combined.
And you couldn't really individually have one to say to responsible.
Now citing been what Mayor Alexander saw her debating climate law.
And then finally thoughts on the absurdity of relying on human rights law to go after metres.
Australia attempted to support its position, asserting that academic scholars have noted the pathways involving anthropogenic climate
change and especially its impacts and implications of fuels on the human rights law,
could not adequately address the depth and breadth of the causes and effects of climate change.
So the committee rejects the substance of the statement.
We found that the state can be held responsible for its own reasons, and in this particular case,
the Committee observed that the formation provided by both parties indicates that the state party is and
must be in recent decades among the countries in which large amounts of greenhouse gas emissions used.
The committee also notes that the state side, the one side on work economy and human development indicators.
So you also have not identified specific acts and omission that were attributable to the state.
So this was not an abstract. They realised they were not relying on argument but rather staple lists of parts.
Unknown issue.
So they argue that those nations have already and will continue to impair their rights in ways that will worsen over time because of the latent,
unpredictable nature of climate change. Now.
They also argue that the protection of the right to life requires the state to review their
energy policies and prevent the dangerous emissions of greenhouse the greenhouse gases.
I'd say more about 50% of the rate. Now a second big topic on the case is the fact that binding invalidates and switches are now clearly
the way to be relevant to the interpretation of human rights in the context of climate gentrification.
So this is this was a race within the petition point that I raised, which basically was you don't interpret the treaty in isolation.
I'm benefited from all the work of the commission, particularly in presentation,
and asserted that you interpret the treaty within its normative environment.
And this was the position that is quite significant because this is part of the Paris Agreement and.
To play a role. In any event, the potential of a human was seen.
We argue that it was relevant to the interpretation of the beliefs of white Australia,
that he was not telling that you couldn't do that on the committee, and I decided that it was relevant to accept this.
On the one hand, obviously, that international agreements are relevant for interpretation of human rights
obligations under the ICC are the implications of anything other than they are,
not just for the purposes of this application. I'm not claiming that red preach the divisive.
Heard arguments, climate change, no mercy.
One of the big issues in the case was whether the threat, the real threat was really going to happen in empathy years and not now.
So the position of Australia was this is all future violations.
This is not about violations of I have any now.
But the authors argue that this actually contradicts the evidence that the state itself,
in the state offices had in connection to what was going on in the state.
The state has already violated its duty to avert devastating and future irreversible impacts on life protected by the cutting,
including impacts caused by existing greenhouse gas emissions.
Protective measures must be initiated today.
Climate change is a slow onset process that a big body may violate its obligations before the worst impacts occur.
This was the positive advance by my clients.
So here I like to point out that there has to be a key distinction between a violation of a primary obligation and the impacts of that.
Now, these impacts coming from, you know, traditional environmental law litigation.
I've been acting for a company on a case on something.
This is a court case example. I'm one of the clear thinkers, for example.
I don't know what this means in certain circumstances. This being may happen at one point in time.
The facts may come many years later, and this is something that the law even considers for limitations issues.
So the same really applies when it comes to environmental harm, even nature.
Here I would argue that it happens in the case of emission.
Now this is based on was not perceived, I would say not always perceived so clearly by everybody.
And I think it is a paramount importance in this type of litigation.
Now. I mentioned that the State has already analysed the situation in this straits and it was quite cool
because they themselves have a big order that says that there was an ongoing humanitarian crisis,
human rights crisis because of the time, which is in fact the territory,
because it is so sensitive to sea level rise that 20 centimetres of sea level rise would actually be helpful for these islands.
Now. The author submitted a statement asserting that adverse effects of climate change have yet to be settled with.
A third of those claims were based both on current violations and imminent violations.
Among those severe impacts from climate change that already were already severe were plotting an invasion of villages,
plotting an invasion or benefit from violence lost by erosion of the traditional plantations and three traditional gardens.
Ocean acidification, reduced ability to practices, traditional culture and above all, to the next generation.
They were expanding in size and strength.
Some of the houses had been solely because of the sea level rise and they were the least endless of all the islands they can place.
One of the authors described it vividly that he's island was changing shape and he was rotating clockwise.
But on a sped up point. When I read these, I couldn't really quite figure out how this could be.
But I visited the island like in in Germany, and when I was there, I understood how the sun is not stable and how, for example,
there they have for 50 years it managed to stabilise the sun but literally also that it was it was going to change.
Changing of the red was moving. So let's say.
A different point. Politics, obligation to do diligence. This is also another.
Oh, sorry. Let me just finish with what the media says here.
So the committee said the authors presented in the communication information indicating the real predicament they have
personally an actual experience owing to disrupt the climate event and its low onset processes set aside in a lawsuit.
They also argue, in part, that those predicaments separately compromised their ability to maintain their livelihood, subsistence and culture.
This was a very important, I say, folly by the community because in fact what?
Acknowledge us. Who? The ability was also acknowledged and the things moving on to the next Boeing focuses on big agents and dividends.
Another key aspect of this is based on the plan to implement positive obligations.
The state argued that specific obligations under the covenant do not require maximum possible resources nor high possible ambition.
But notes such an unprecedented would not only place an impossible burden on state,
but would also be displaced reasonable policy choices made in good faith states.
And they are set to for some challenges that impact on the enjoyment of human rights
under the covenant and decide how to distribute limited resources to address them.
And he'd also argue that it would be inappropriate and unfounded for the committee to
interpret the code in such a way as now to remain the control and difficult policy decisions
of a democratically elected government that inherently compromises trade offs and the
allocation of resources across a range of challenges to the fulfilment of human rights.
The urge the Commission to adopt an unduly broad interpretation of a political obligation.
Now in the concurring opinion of member Jp Berry.
He stated the following The states are under a positive obligation to take all appropriate measures to ensure the protection of human life.
In this context,
the due diligence standard required the state to set the national climate mitigation targets at the level of the highest possible ambition and to
pursue effective domestic mitigation measures with the aim of perceiving those targets when a state is found not to have completed the commitments.
Finally, the grounds for this question for the complainants.
While the big concern could be required to step up efforts and prevent similar violations in the future.
He actually said something that I find Cousteau and he wants that since it is thermostatic accumulation of CO2 and other GHG that over time
he described global warming and climate change if due diligence when taking mitigation and adaptation action based on the best science.
This is an individual responsibility of the state relative to the risk of the state,
and its capacity to address is a higher standard of due diligence applied in respect of those are
faced with significant total with significant total emissions very high for capita emissions.
Whether these are parts or conservation, given the greater burden that their emissions play on the global planet.
So while the majority of people refer to these points, specifically the authors of uncompetitive abatement,
the highest court in Australia had ruled that the state do not own a duty of care for failing to
regulate environmental harm was one of the reasons why the committee found the case of New Zealand.
So in other words, the needs and obligations of the citizens, the ease of obligation, of duty, of care.
And you could infer that from from the point that the point was not available to them the maximum allowable in the national system.
Look, Simon. An additional point.
Individual people's rights and climate change is a major win for Indigenous peoples.
Considering that the Human Rights Committee has not been extremely good, to say the least.
This is one of the most important cases the committee has produced on slides that indicate that indigenous people's rights and as you can see,
vindicates them even from similar claims in other systems like the one in the commission I just saw.
So if you go. And so on.
Article 17, which is the protection column, was acknowledged that the home of one of the orphans,
for example, was rolled by flooding in 2010 and that they also depended on fish.
So this is his most important is how home is also because school is not.
How would you mean in this case was broader. Was was was the idea was was where you are a body and what you consider you are unfit for land.
So they also depended on fish made them resources love crops please for the
livelihoods depend on the help of the surrounding ecosystems for their own.
For their own would be. It is what the Committee acknowledge and consider.
The aforementioned elements contribute components of the traditional indigenous way of life of the authors.
We enjoy a better relationship with the territory and that these elements can be considered to fall under Article 17 of the Covenant.
I really highlight these because as you can see, it is not just territorial land.
Territorial waters are also entered into this analysis and I think this is going to be and I would come back to my conclusion,
quite crucial because they have already been accepted where all these impacts like ocean
acidification impacting on the species that you could find a certain point in time.
So all of these could potentially be extremely useful for a tribunal such as it will be, for example,
assessing potentially and, you know, a complaint or also an advisor opinion on on climate change on those.
So the committee made a number of important considerations concerning Article 27.
The. They really decided to paper over the indigenous peoples.
So to maintain the ability to believe the traditional ways and to submit to the children
of future generations that culture and occupations and use of land and sea resources,
and that this all disclosed a violation of the state's positive obligation to protect the rights of the minority culture.
So here we have seen, again, the point, the positive obligation, and again,
the sign up here is due diligence on why they fell on this sustainable of care,
because their own agencies had already planned that there was going to be a human rights presence in the tourism space, and yet they did nothing.
And the place was considered as part of.
The roll call in a way so and so he was not at all needing help.
So this really shows you that to be within the legal framework you are probably.
So DeLay would make you already be accountable or be liable for moving on from that.
Why collide with this is that this is a very was a very key submission in the
case the committee decided we would call in general number six where adequate
sample is held that the obligation for the parties to respect and ensure the right
to life extend reasonably foreseeable fears of a life threatening situation.
That kind of resulting loss of life would be the knowledge that back in 2008 or then a number of things.
And they also included that that those threats may include adverse climate change impacts.
But having said all of that,
they unconvincingly avoided the inherent contradiction of finding a violation of the sentence seven being in this case, but not a article thing.
Because how can indigenous people possibly have a life with dignity when the culture accepted by the community and the
existence of the group is threatened by a plot by climate change to the extent described by the authors in the case?
So this really gave rise to a number of separate opinions.
Committee member Massa found that there had been a violation of five six and if better than a third
party starts with an obligation to prevent a foreseeable loss of life for the bulk of climate change,
I'm wondering what possible means. But it is quite important to.
Now the joint opinion by committee members. I can see a frown on the part of the dissenting pound about the right to life,
and b critically noted using the real unforeseeable foreseeable responder the majority the required requires adverse events.
Now this is wrong. And this is the joint the joint the dissenting committee members didn't agree that they said
that the majority was required adverse impact to demonstrate an Article six violation.
But they they found wrong that it was wrong. Now, in my view,
the joint opinion is blind and the majority view reflects a confusion between obligations
under Article six and the reach and the impacts of the violation of the primary obligations.
But most importantly. It is a lack of understanding of.
The meaning of life, though they were persuaded that the.
The environments that were sustaining the lives of all these people on the island were collapsing.
And yet. They were big.
They wanted to see it. Look what they couldn't control.
It were real, the war imminent and the war possibility in the correct manner.
As the Supreme Court in the Netherlands case.
And I'm going to go to that very quickly. When I grew up, I'll. Now the.
One of the things that I would highlight here is that what is foreseeable is also not what is imminent,
is not doing is not about time, but about ten or 15 years of the island is no longer there.
The issue of imminence is about how real you can see how the risk it is for the people that are arguing that impacts.
It is not a simple reality knowing it's a notion of reality as a notion of how direct that threat is is against.
And in this particular case, everything has been demonstrated in terms of how real this was at the moment that that became real.
The duty to act diligently feels comfortable.
The joint opinion added While we agree that the state party is not solely responsible for climate change.
The main question before the committee is significantly narrower Has the state party violated the covenant by failing
to implement adaptation and mitigation measures to combat adverse climate change impacts within its territory?
Responding to the offers. The majority opinion relies on project initiated by a state since 2013, with the state as one of them was sued.
A year later, they wanted to try to put together some money for seawalls and in a way hoping it was good that they think so,
but in a way that they were trying to see what we are already doing, where we have to do.
Now the majority opinion relies on the project. While these measures had been climate change resilience.
The majority that is not sufficient sufficiently consider the violations that had already occurred at the time of filing this communication.
That is the failure to repeat commitments obligations under Article six.
Nicole Kidman. And this is the last point I'm making for.
In practical terms, however, it didn't matter whether we got there via the gate or the right, like by the gate.
A sense the obligations of conservation measures is a legal consequence of the findings, I would argue.
And the reason for that is because the immediate steps towards the island being in the complaint are entitled to full reparation.
The meaning of what full reparation intend is defined by international law.
The committee referred to compensation, which is a precedent now with the notion of loss and damage.
This is connected to the fact that the state knew. So this is very important knowledge.
Now this board also at the committee,
a crucially a paper that they find is also under an obligation to take steps to prevent similar violations in the future.
Now, these people, I would argue, within the scope of warranty, of no repetition.
And it can only be achieved by information measures because it doesn't matter
how well you do it if the emissions are continuing in the manner they are.
So the committee gave I would say that it is an important legal consequence arising from the findings of the committee,
which now has to be implemented. The component of being able to points out that these as well.
You read that, you can see that. He also points out that these duties somehow implicit in the decision of the majority.
Now, the committee gave the report on the measures taken to implement this decision, which is that when this was notified, what?
Now I want to make perhaps some some final conclusion or be made on the way forward where things that need to be the big achievement,
but they're also things that need to be clarified. So let me first talk about the issue of imminence.
So this has to be correct.
The right to life is the message in the decision, and this has to be addressed is possible that is required in security for generals.
And maybe a court that has a bench with more generals may be able to engage in a better position.
But on the other hand, you had the gender Supreme Court case where, you know, these are domestic court judges that never nevertheless got it right.
Why? Because it is quoting about.
About that position that their immediate was not prepared to imminence in the sense that the risk must materialise within a short period of time,
but rather that the risk in question is directly questioning the presence of both the protection to the European Court of Human Rights,
also regarding risks that may only materialise in the longer term.
And this was a position we advance the joint and separate opinion.
So it the majority didn't.
But sometimes when you have so many disagreements with a majority, when you have the because you know there's an issue there,
perhaps they have to be look again for the future in control cases.
Now, on the issue of due diligence, again, I think that this is going to be it's quite an important sign that it is already becoming clearer.
This case is contributing to that. The Heathrow expansion case, for example, in the UK Supreme Court decision in that case, I submit.
Ms. So also he's here.
It's quite clear in this case that it's on obligations, planning obligations if they thought it's on their own inhabitants.
I mean, in the Heathrow case, somehow the UK just kind of said, you know, it's not unincorporated.
We've been so talking about the place of women and so on.
So in a way, kind of thinking this is not important for UK.
Guidance. But really there is an obligation, human rights connected on emissions toward your own population anyways.
So it's not that it was a boundary issue, but it's also an issue that will affect your own people.
And this has to be over. There it is. We did not in the UK look at the by the women doesn't really entail any obligation of resort.
Of course not. But now we have seen that what impelled is an obligation and obligation to our
best efforts of due diligence and to do that with the best available science.
So definitely this is going to be a point that will continue being referred to in cases.
And now we can see how relevant this is. This is for human rights obligations.
Obligated to provide remedy. Now it's clear that the same obligation in this country to climate change.
So domestic systems should run if they don't have to do so unless they want to be sued in the national systems.
Positive obligation to protect some. Yes, you can be sued for not following that approach.
Criticisms. A couple of them just closed. This case took about four years to litigate from 2019 to do with long period of time.
I think the procedurally speaking system should deal with these emergency in a different manner.
I think that the European Court has taken a better approach in human rights to date in actually prioritising this type of cases,
and I feel that is the correct approach. Another point that they probably didn't get right.
And I think that it needs to be corrected because these two right leaning heads into the band,
and that's quite crucial to understand how the dynamics of life play in a case like this one.
And the Human Rights Committee. You didn't actually see that interdependence and the connections between two lives.
You know, and like point, I'm worried that a separate analysis which really goes contrary to,
you know, the most basic, in my view, my position when it comes to the rights.
So finally, I'd say that this case potentially can be very helpful for you than the other cases.
And I say not only for territorial jurisdiction cases that are currently before the European Court of Human Rights,
but I say that possibly before the ICJ,
in my opinion,
the people in the pipeline clearly also likely to be very important in a potential case because for the reasons that I mentioned briefly.
So we have we have a number of reasons to be hopeful of this bond as it has been discussed, perhaps not, you know,
the way that I consider this applied, but certainly providing an amazing way for the Torres Strait Islanders.
And I like to finish with a quote from them. And if I may, I am I still in time to do that?
So this is this is key. But I and he said.
But then something really important to our culture because they tell us how we live and what we call different times.
They lead to the four winds that we have on the island becomes at different times of year the queen windscreen before the species for hunting,
fishing, harvesting. They are like the patterns that shape life.
We as people are so connected to everything around us. The island is what make us.
It keeps us our identity. We know everything about environmental.
This island, the land of sea, the plants, the weeds, the stars, the seasons, the island make us who we are.
Our whole life comes from the island and the nature here.
Environment. It is a spiritual connection. We know how to have the beach from this island right here.
We get that from generations of knowledge that has been passed down to us.
I know very every species of plant animal on this island, the way the vegetation changes, what to harvest at different times of the year.
Now you cannot predict the seasons. This is really what outraged me when I when I read these statements and if I go to Singapore, not just be.
Our ancient culture, one of the oldest living causes in the world is threatened.
Historically, we are sort of Strait Islanders have had our land and resources taken and our sacred sites.
So I feel as if we are neglected and our sacred sites threatened.
Again, I would probably be alive to see my children not having anything.
When they are adults, they will not have anything for the children who will be living on another man's land.
That is with my identity. They must seek. Legal identity will die.
I know I love to teach my children, but I cannot teach my children about that inheritance when I'm not in men's land.
We won't have the sacredness and the power of our culture.
Our land is a stream connecting us to a culture. It ties us to who we are.
If we were to have to move, we would be like helium balloons disconnected from our culture.
Our culture would become extinct. We are dying ways of thinking.
This was the way they put their stories forward.
And this case has vindicated then were rights actually need the protection of the state and we are going to
obviously blow it up most ensure these these decision which in a way have already been put in the state point.
It's that nearly a year after this case was filed. So the efforts of these, in a way, been isolated.
You have seen the road and I have showed you the road.
It took a lot of processing and thinking already from the moment when the means failed.
And I want to find out why did the means failed. I want to dedicate the work I did on this case to them.
And it was a sheila which perhaps will not succeed on the particular case,
but then which really were telling us that very much what was going to happen.
And I would say that I'd like you to go. All of you in this room, I'm going to tell you really what imminence means,
because any any effects is not going to be like a slow is going to be abrupt.
And in a way, we are already perceiving that somehow. So this is not just in a case and it's not just an academic exercise.
This is unfortunately crucial for the survival of the world and our own survival.
Thank you very much.