This meant that the states now must regulate all environmental activities, especially those gas emissions that harm the environment. To achieve this goal, states have the responsibility to regulate businesses, while also ensuring that they do not harm human rights. Governments can reach these by using “suggesting changes to business operating conditions, taxation, contributions to just transition plans and strategies, investment in education, adaptation measures and addressing loss and damage.” If businesses do not comply, then the government has the right to intervene and demand compensation, for the harm they cause. actionEveryone has the right to live in a clean and safe environment free from life-threatening environmental factors. With the increasing frequency of natural disasters in recent years, people and the government recognize the need to stabilize and protect the natural environment. With a wide-ranging 300-page document setting out perspectives on climate change and human rights, the court aims to ensure that local state governments assume a legal obligation to protect the people of current and future generations with a stable climate and a safe living environment. Many states, including Colombia, Chile, and Costa Rica, have taken early action, and the United States also needs to do so.
The IACHR’s founding purpose is to interpret and apply the American Convention on Human Rights, and local states should also take the situation into account with broader regional and international laws. It affirms that this finding applies to all 35 members of the Organization of American States (OAS), which includes the United States and Canada.
This meant that the states now must regulate all environmental activities, especially those gas emissions that harm the environment. To achieve this goal, states have the responsibility to regulate businesses while also ensuring that they do not harm human rights. Governments can reach these by using “suggesting changes to business operating conditions, taxation, contributions to just transition plans and strategies, investment in education, adaptation measures, and addressing loss and damage.” If businesses do not comply, then the government has the right to intervene and demand compensation for the harm they cause.
This is the first time for the OAS court to include the idea of “right to a stable climate”, and just as Marcella Ribeiro, a senior human rights and environment attorney for the Asociación Interamericana para la Defensa del Ambiente (AIDA) said, “This is an opportunity for a structural transformation that will correct historical inequality and protect people and ecosystems.”
Source：