RICH COUNTRIES must start basing their climate change policies on human rights principles and stop using economic excuses to "wriggle out of their responsibilities", says international aid agency Oxfam in a new report published today, writes Frank McDonald, Environment Editor.
Oxfam is submitting the report, Climate Wrongs and Human Rights, to the new UN High Commissioner for Human Rights, South African lawyer Navi Pillay, whose office is reviewing the relationship between human rights and climate change.
It says that rich countries' excessive carbon emissions are violating the rights of millions of the world's poorest people.
"Climate change was first seen as a scientific problem, then an economic one. Now it is becoming a matter of international justice," said report author Kate Raworth.
According to Oxfam, the trade-off between the economic and human costs of tackling the problem is "deeply unethical" and risks the world failing to cut emissions to stay below the threshold of an increase of two degrees in average global temperatures.
"Rich countries, led by the G8, are proposing merely to halve global emissions by 2050. But we need a deal that guarantees a cut of at least 80 per cent by 2050. They are using spurious economic arguments to do as little as possible," Ms Raworth said.
"That is why we need a strong UN deal in 2009 to cut emissions and support adaptation . . . Rich country polluters have been fully aware of their culpability for many years. If they fail to cut emissions and help people now, they could face legal action later."
Oxfam is pressing for changes in international human rights laws and institutions, saying the authors of the 1948 Universal Declaration of Human Rightscould never have imagined - 60 years on - having to deal with such a complex global challenge as climate change.
"When vulnerable communities have tried to use human rights law for climate justice, it has thrown up major weaknesses," Ms Raworth said.
"It is extremely difficult for people in poor countries to identify who to sue, how to prove the injury done, or even where to bring their case."
The Oxfam report also complains that financing to help poorer countries adapt to climate change is being "woefully under- resourced". Although some $2 billion (€1.42 billion) is needed to meet the most urgent adaptation needs of 50 least developed countries, total contributions now stand at just $92 million - "less than what people in the US spend buying sun-tan lotion in a month".
In conjunction with its new report, Oxfam is running an international competition for lawyers, academics and law students to come up with the most innovative legal case for a developing country to take legal action on injuries suffered from climate change.
Further details from www.oxfam.org/climatecompetition