Climate Change Current Activities -

Human Rights and Climate Change

In conjuction with the work of CIEL's Human Rights and Environment Program, CIEL is active in supporting explicit incorporation of human rights standards into the negotiating texts of the UNFCCC.

By helping support other NGO's and Delegates with specific textual proposals, we have contributed to moving the debate from whether to how to include reference to human rights in the negoiating text. Further, CIEL has been active in promoting a rights based appoach to the Clean Development Mechanism and in the elaboration of REDD both within and outside the climate negotiations.

Finally, given that the prospects for a rapid and successful conclusion of the UNFCCC talks appear dim, CIEL is engaged in efforts to identify ways to use innovative legal strategies to move the agenda forward. Such efforts could include petitions similar to the groundbreaking work CIEL and Earthjustice undertook on behalf of the Intuit in the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights.

Inuit Petition Recasts Climate Change Debate

Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL), along with Earthjustice, prepared a historic petition that was filed with the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (IACHR), on behalf of the Inuit people. 

CIEL’s actions changed the debate world leaders are having about climate change by introducing a moral and human rights element.