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The UN's top human rights body voted 8 October to adopt a resolution recognizing the right to a safe,
clean, healthy, and sustainable environment, although some of the
world's biggest emitters are not sold on the matter.
In the 48th session of the UN Human Rights Council (HRC), a push
by countries including Costa Rica, Morocco, Slovenia, Switzerland,
and the Maldives led to a vote on and then recognition of that
right.
In advance of the vote, the current UN Special Rapporteur on
Human Rights and the Environment David Boyd tweeted that the first holder of
his post, Fatmah Zohrah Ksentini, urged recognition of the right in
1994.
After the vote, Boyd said in a statement that "the world's
future looks a little bit brighter today."
"This has life-changing potential in a world where the global
environmental crisis causes more than nine million premature deaths
every year," Boyd said, adding. "It will spark constitutional
changes and stronger environmental laws, with positive implications
for air quality, clean water, healthy soil, sustainably produced
food, green energy, climate change, biodiversity and the use of
toxic substances."
The vote was the culmination of over 40 years of efforts to
recognize the right, Sébastien Duyck, senior attorney at the Center
for International Environmental Law (CIEL), said in a
statement.
"This new recognition will serve as a catalyst for institutions
and other stakeholders to take steps that better respect, protect,
and fulfill the right. It includes, but is not limited to, the
mobilizing resources and political will," he said.
Amnesty International Law and Policy Director Ashfaq Khalfan
added 8 October that the vote brought hope in the context of
widespread and increasing climate disasters, and was a milestone
moment in the battle against environmental degradation.
Skeptics
Still, the vote's eventual impact is unclear. The resolution is
nonbinding and some of the world's top polluters failed to or were
unable to vote for the resolution, and even those who did indicated
reservations.
China, India, Japan, and the Russian Federation abstained from
the vote. The US withdrew from the HRC under President Donald
Trump. And there were worries the UK, the host of the upcoming UN
COP26 climate change meeting in Glasgow would also withhold
support, according to activists.
A couple of days before the vote, Yasmine Ahmed, UK Director,
Human Rights Watch and Friends of the Earth co-CEOs Miriam Turner
and Hugh Knowles warned UK Prime Boris Johnson
he was in danger of undoing much of the good his efforts in the
run-up to COP26 had promised if the British government didn't back
the resolution.
"With just four weeks before the UK hosts the COP26 in Glasgow,
the UK's pledge to be a climate and environment leader is again
being contradicted by its own actions," they wrote, adding that
despite lofty promises, the UK was opposing the resolution.
The UK did back the resolution in the end, and Ahmed tweeted that Johnson and the UK
government had decided to be on the right side of history.
Still, UK officials continue to express doubts.
Rita French, UK Ambassador for Human Rights, told the HRC that
"recognition of the right in the resolution is without due regard
to the formation of international human rights law and without
prejudice to the UK's legal position."
"A human right to a safe, clean, healthy and sustainable
environment has not been agreed in any human rights treaty and it
is yet to emerge as a customary right," she said, adding that
recognizing rights without due consideration and a common
understanding at an international level of what they comprise
creates ambiguity.
US rejoining?
America, meanwhile, did not get a vote. The Biden administration
wants a seat at the table again after Trump pulled out in 2018. It
may regain that seat—and voting rights—as early as 13
October, according to media reports.
Still, the Biden administration has its doubts about the merits
of the HRC due to a number of issues. In February, when saying the
US would return to the HRC table, the
Department of State tabbed it as a "flawed body."
State said the HRC was "in need of reform to its agenda,
membership, and focus, including its disproportionate focus on
Israel. However, our withdrawal in June 2018 did nothing to
encourage meaningful change, but instead created a vacuum of US
leadership, which countries with authoritarian agendas have used to
their advantage."
Whether the US would have supported the right to a sustainable
environment if it were at the table on 8 October is up for
debate.
The US abstained from a vote on a UN
resolution recognizing the right to clean water and sanitation in
2010. It has also not ratified a number of human rights treaties
such as the Convention on Violence Against Women, the Convention on
the Rights of the Child and the International Covenant on Economic,
Social and Cultural Rights.
The US continues to work with its allies on issues of concern,
including when it comes to the HRC, an administration official
said.
Next steps
Either way on US involvement, the latest resolution is just the
first step for activists around the globe, as well as Boyd.
Boyd urged governments 8 October to incorporate the right to a
safe, clean, healthy, and sustainable environment into their
constitutions and legislation. He also urged leaders taking part in
talks in Glasgow and at the UN conference on biodiversity (COP15)
starting in Kunming, China, this week, to put human rights at the
center of their actions.
It was a stance echoed by 166 civil society organizations and
individuals 11 October, who called upon world leaders to
put human rights at the center of environmental policy in an open
letter. Respecting and protecting human rights and protecting the
environment are inextricably linked, they said.
Resolving the intersecting crises humankind faces, the groups
said, demands a holistic approach to environmental policy that
embeds human rights and tackles systemic problems, including
historically rooted social injustice, ecological destruction, state
capture by corporations, corruption, and impunity, as well as and
social and economic inequality.
