‘We were heard’: the Pacific students who took their climate fight to the ICJ – and won
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The ICJ’s advisory opinion for the first time gives the Pacific and all vulnerable communities a legal mechanism to hold states accountable and to demand the climate action long overdue.
In the landmark opinion published on Wednesday, the court said countries must prevent harm to the climate system and that failing to do so could result in their having to pay compensation and make other forms of restitution. It says states are liable for all kinds of activities that harm the climate, but it takes explicit aim at fossil fuels.
For a young Pacific woman at the forefront of this global fight, this win wasn’t just political, it was personal. And it was history.
“We were there. And we were heard,” she said.
The group of students all hailed from Pacific island countries that are among the most vulnerable in the world to the climate crisis. They came up with the idea of changing international law by getting the world’s highest court to issue an advisory opinion on the climate crisis.
The campaign was led by the nation of Vanuatu, a Pacific state of about 300,000 people that sits at the forefront of the climate crisis and has been ranked by the United Nations as the country most prone to natural disasters.
