THE HAGUE, Netherlands (AP) — Switzerland hasn't shown that it's meeting the requirements of a landmark climate change decision from Europe’s highest human rights court, the Council of Europe announced Friday.
The council said the European Court of Human Rights has sided with a group of older Swiss women against their government, ruled in April 2024 that countries must better protect their people from the consequences of climate change and that Switzerland “had failed to comply with its duties” to combat climate change and meet emissions targets.
Six months after the decision, Switzerland asked for the case to be shut, arguing it was fully in compliance with the obligations set by the Strasbourg-based court. The intergovernmental body that supervises the court’s judgments, the Committee of Ministers, recognized that Switzerland had made some progress but hadn’t demonstrated it was meeting all of the requirements.
Environmentalists hailed the decision as a victory.
“The Swiss Federal Council is not getting away with its arguments at the Committee of Ministers. Switzerland must improve its climate policy to remedy the violation of our human rights,” Rosmarie Wydler-Wälti, co-president of Senior Women for Climate Protection and one of the plaintiffs in the case, said in a statement.
The group, which counts around 2,000 members across Switzerland with an average age of 73, argued that older women’s rights are especially infringed on because they are most affected by the extreme heat that will become more frequent due to global warming.
Following a three-day meeting this week, Bern was asked to provide more information on a number of topics including “concrete measures being taken to alleviate the most severe or imminent consequences of climate change in Switzerland, including any particular needs for protection, especially for persons in vulnerable situation.”
The Committee of Ministers, composed of the foreign affairs ministers from the body’s 46 member states, will meet again in September.
The decision ignited debate in Switzerland and the government claims the court has overstepped its mandate.
Corina Heri, an expert in climate change litigation at Tilburg Law School, said the decision to ask for more information was typical of the compliance process at the ECHR.
“Nothing is final yet,” she told The Associated Press.
Environmental groups, frustrated by what they see as the failure of elected officials to combat climate change, have increasingly turned to courts to advance their cause. Late last year, the International Court of Justice took up the largest case in its history, hearing the plight of several small island nations helpless in combating the devastating impact of climate change that they feel endangers their very survival.
The world has already warmed 1.3 degrees C (2.3 F) since pre-industrial times because of the burning of fossil fuels. Between 1990 and 2020, sea levels rose by a global average of 10 centimeters (3.9 inches) and parts of the South Pacific have seen significantly more.
Molly Quell, The Associated Press
