Excellencies, friends, colleagues,
We appreciate the opportunity to participate in this important discussion today.
As you know, the UN Human Rights Council passed resolution 48/13 on October 8, 2021. It recognized that a clean, healthy, and sustainable environment was a human right.
The resolution recognizes that we all face an ever-present reality.
A clean, healthy, and sustainable environment is essential for our survival, air quality, food intake, and water consumption.
Out of the 150 countries that have been recognized by the Human Rights Council (HRC), more than 150 others recognize and protect the right for a healthy environment in their constitutions, national laws or ratifications of international instruments.
Several governments opposed explicit mentions to this right in recent consensus-based negotiations of the Commission on the Status of Women’s conclusions, the meeting of the sub-organs to the Convention on Biological Diversity, and the political declaration for UNEP@50.
Human Rights Council Resolution 48/13 unambiguously recognizes the right of all people to a healthy, clean, and sustainable environment. It invites governments to continue to consider the issue at the UN General Assembly.
The General Assembly could help to promote more ambitious, coordinated and coordinated actions to protect the environment by recognizing the right to a healthy, sustainable, and clean environment. This was achieved by the General Assembly’s recognition of the rights for water and sanitation.
This is where the word recognition is important.
Although governments may recognize the rights of human beings, they do not create them.
These are rights that we all have because we are human beings.
They are inherent in us all.
Like the rights to water, sanitation, and clean air, it is clear that a healthy, sustainable environment is a human right.
Recognizing rights at all levels of policy and law creates better conditions for accountability and action.
This is crucial and urgent in this instance.
The UN High Commissioner to Human Rights has placed the triple global crisis of nature loss, climate change and pollution at the top human rights challenges of our time.
Pollution is responsible for an estimated one in six premature deaths. Climate change is causing the displacement of millions every year. The loss of biodiversity could lead to the collapse entire ecosystems.
We need the international cooperation to act with unity and solidarity to use every resource possible to ensure that the human right to a healthy world is protected and fulfilled.
It is impossible to fail to meet this challenge.
It is not possible to deny the existence of God.
It is not possible to delay.
These pathways can lead to disaster, according to the latest reports from the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change.
This is our reality.
The UN system has called on action and has been urged to take action.
The Secretary General’s Call to Action for Human Rights gathers senior UN officials in the areas of human rights, the environment and development, and children to promote the human right to a clean and healthy environment.
The environment must be protected for everyone. However, there are still harmful practices and insufficient action.
Those who have contributed least to environmental degrading are often the ones most at risk of suffering its worst human rights effects.
Environmental degradation has adisproportionate impact on the poor, women and children, indigenous peoples and persons with disabilities.
The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change recognized that people in vulnerable situations can benefit from a rights-based, inclusive approach to environmental action. This will help them live better lives and support better environmental outcomes.
This is the only way to achieve sustainable development that respects the environment and fulfills all human rights.
The recognition by the Human Rights Council of the right to a healthy ecosystem has given momentum to this approach. Further recognition could increase this impact.
To make this right for all, we must take more action.
OHCHR and its Partners work around the globe to promote the human right to a healthy and sustainable environment, increase the protection of environmental human rights Defenders, support rights-based action by UN Country Teams, raise awareness about the negative human rights effects of environmental degradation, and elevate the voices and concerns of those most in need.
I encourage you to have a discussion today about how to look beyond recognition and take action to protect the environment for future generations.
OHCHR looks forward working with you in this endeavor.
Thank you.