CliDef Submits Advice for UN Special Rapporteur Report on Human Rights Defenders Working on Climate and a Just Transition
The Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders will focus the next thematic report on the situation of human rights defenders working on climate change and a just transition. The Special Rapporteur, Mary Lawlor, identified human rights defenders working on the climate crisis as a priority in her work, not only because of the global importance of their cause, but because of the risks and retaliation they have faced in recent years.
Global Climate Legal Defense (CliDef) was established in the face of escalating legal threats against climate defenders, recognizing the fundamental role of legal defense support to an effective climate justice strategy and is well placed to advised the Special Rapporteur on this report.
The submitted input details demonstrable success stories of climate activists worldwide. As the examples show, it is only with the pressure from a vigorous climate movement that public and private actors take decisive action on the climate. The success case studies—some provided by CliDef, others taken from the movement more widely—also underscore a broader trend: climate defenders are not merely resisting fossil-fuel expansion, but compelling governments to rewrite laws, scrap mega projects, and recognize the right to a livable climate. Each win widens legal and political space for the next, confirming that determined, locally rooted movements remain the engine of climate progress.
The report also details emerging risks and trends in legal retaliation, which are symptomatic of conditions CliDef sees in every region the organization operates in, including intense polarization–which allows governments to legitimize and rhetorically dress up their attacks as a crackdown on extremism and “ecoterrorism”–and are part of a broader drive towards authoritarianism. Particularly, the report documents the growing criminalization of climate activism, generally falling into two categories: old laws stretched in novel ways to cover the activities of climate activities or the drafting of new anti-protest rules.
The report covers trends in all regions, specifically studying the countries of: Algeria, Austria, Bangladesh, Canada, Denmark, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Finland, France, Germany, India, Indonesia, Italy, Kenya, Liberia, Malaysia, Malawi, Mozambique, Netherlands, Nigeria, Philippines, Poland, Singapore, Spain, South Korea, Tunisia, Turkey, Uganda, United Kingdom, United States, and Zimbabwe.