The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR), based in Strasbourg, issued a historic ruling this Tuesday following a lawsuit filed by a group of older Swiss women concerned about the repercussions of the climate crisis on their quality of life and health. . This is the KlimaSeniorinnen Association. The ruling, issued by the Grand Chamber of the Court with 16 votes in favor and only one against, recognizes that Switzerland has violated the human rights of older people by not taking sufficient measures against climate change. This is the first time that the Strasbourg Court condemns a State for its lack of initiative to stop climate change
The lawsuit was brought to the Court by the Verein KlimaSeniorinnen association, made up of 2,500 Swiss women with an average age of 73 years, who denounced the Swiss State for its lack of action to mitigate climate change, which has negative consequences on their living conditions. and in your health. Among the plaintiffs are four women over the age of 80 who experienced health problems during the heat waves. Sadly, one of the plaintiffs, born in 1931, died during the judicial process.
The lawsuit by the nicknamed “Grandmas for the Climate” focused on the violation of the fundamental rights of articles 2 and 8 of the European Convention on Human Rights, which enshrine the rights to life and health, and to privacy and family without interference, as well as the right to a fair trial and an effective remedy. The women argued that Switzerland was failing in its duty to effectively protect life and ensure respect for their private and family life, including their home, in the context of climate change and neglecting the overwhelming scientific evidence in this regard.
This ruling marks a significant milestone in the climate justice movement not only for Switzerland but also for other European countries facing similar challenges. The Klimaseniorinnen Association hopes that this decision will prompt governments to take stronger measures to address climate change and protect the rights of older people across the continent.
Environmental entities have celebrated the ruling and have not hesitated to describe it as historic. “This legal victory is the culmination of a long strategy by organized civil society around the world to take the climate emergency to court and will mark a turning point in climate law around the world,” said Irene Rubiera. , lawyer for Ecologistas en Acción.
“In recent years, litigation over climate inaction has increased, and after this precedent, legal activism for climate will be unstoppable,” he added.
"For the first time, an international court recognizes that human rights include the right to climate protection. It is now also clear that Swiss climate policy violates the most fundamental human rights," declared the spokesperson for the Swiss movement Grève du Climate (Climate Strike). for Climate), Anja Gada.
However, the judges overturned the lawsuit that six young Portuguese had filed against Portugal and also against 31 other European countries for which they wanted a conviction, arguing that these nations are adopting insufficient policies to mitigate climate change. The lawsuit alleged that the forest fires that have occurred every year in Portugal since 2017 are a direct consequence of climate change that poses risks to their health.
The judges rejected their allegations without examining the merits of the matter, firstly because the six plaintiffs flouted a fundamental rule of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR), which is that domestic remedies must be exhausted. of the country they denounce before taking a case to Strasbourg. The young people had argued that the climate emergency exempted them from that basic legal rule, but the ECtHR did not accept that thesis.
The magistrates point out that the ECtHR "is not a court of first instance" and that it is not appropriate to hear the lawsuit, in which the young people claimed that their right to life has been violated.
In the ruling, the ECHR also explains that the fact that the six young people are citizens of the European Union "cannot be used" to refer to a jurisdictional link between them and the rest of the defendant States that also belong to the Union itself.
The ECtHR concludes that there is no provision in the United Nations Convention to justify its extension, through judicial interpretation, of the jurisdiction of extraterritorial protection of the respondent States in the manner requested by the six young people. "From the above it follows that territorial jurisdiction is established with respect to Portugal, and that no title of jurisdiction can be established with respect to the other defendant States," he points out.
Finally, and regarding the status of young people as victims, the ECtHR says that their individual situation suffers from a "significant lack of clarity that complicates the examination" of whether they are aggrieved by the effects of climate change.
But beyond this case, which due to the form of its approach already raised many doubts about the possibility of it going forward, the movement in favor of justice received the ruling as a boost and a breath of hope from the Strasbourg Court as that the ruling condemns Switzerland in the lawsuit filed by some elderly women from that country.
In her ruling, the President of the Court, Siofra O'Leary, stated that the Swiss Government had not met its greenhouse gas emissions reduction targets and that there were gaps in its national regulatory framework. "It is clear that future generations are likely to bear an increasing burden of the consequences of current failures and omissions in the fight against climate change," said Ella O'Leary.
One of the leaders of KlimaSeniorinnen, Rosmarie Wydler-Wälti, said she does not yet know the scope of the decision. "We keep asking our lawyers, 'Is this the right thing to do?' And they tell us, 'This is the most you could have achieved. The biggest possible victory.'" A spokesman for the Swiss Energy Ministry reacted to the ruling by saying: "We are on the right track. We are doing a lot."
Specifically, European judges considered that Switzerland failed to comply with its obligations regarding the rights of these elderly women (more than half are over 75 years old) to prevent them from suffering the effects of global warming.
They illustrated this by pointing out that there have been shortcomings in Swiss policy to quantify, through carbon pricing or otherwise, the limitation of its greenhouse emissions. Along the same lines, Switzerland did not respect in the past the objectives it had set to reduce these emissions.
Jaime Doreste, lawyer for Ecologistas en Acción and expert in climate law, declared: “Once again, the generation of our elders shows us the way to defend a sustainable future on a habitable planet, also through judicial means.”
“From a legal point of view, it is an achievement and a significant advance that the ECtHR establishes that 'Article 8 of the Convention encompasses the right to effective protection by state authorities against the serious adverse effects of climate change on life, health, well-being and quality of life', as well as the correlative positive obligations of the States in this regard.
