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Submission of the Maldives to the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights

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Submission of the Maldives to the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights Maldives Submission under Resolution HRC 7/23 ‐ FINAL ‐‐ 25 September 2008 HUMAN RIGHTS COUNCIL RESOLUTION 7/23 "HUMAN RIGHTS AND CLIMATE CHANGE" Submission of the Maldives to the Office of the UN High Commissioner for Human Rights 25th September 2008 1 Maldives Submission under Resolution HRC 7/23 ‐ FINAL ‐‐ 25 September 2008 TABLE OF CONTENTS Foreword.......................................................................................................................................................4 Executive Summary.......................................................................................................................................5 I. Introduction .............................................................................................................................................11 The Link Between Human Rights and the Environment .........................................................................12 General Circumstances of the Maldives .................................................................................................14 Physio‐Geographic, Economic, and Demographic Features...............................................................14 Political and Cultural Context .............................................................................................................16 II. The Physical and Human Impacts of Climate Change.............................................................................17 Sea Level Rise..........................................................................................................................................18 Physical Impacts..................................................................................................................................18 Human Impacts of Sea Level Rise .......................................................................................................20 Temperature Increase.............................................................................................................................24 Physical Impacts of Temperature Increase.........................................................................................24 Human Impacts of Temperature Increase ..........................................................................................25 Extreme Weather Events ........................................................................................................................29 Physical Impacts of Extreme Weather Events ....................................................................................29 Human Impacts of Extreme Weather Events......................................................................................30 Changes in Precipitation .........................................................................................................................36 Physical Impacts of Changes in Precipitation......................................................................................36 Human Impacts of Changes in Precipitation.......................................................................................37 III. The Implications of Climate Change for Human Rights .........................................................................38 Collective Rights Impacted by Climate Change: Right to Self‐Determination and to a Means of Subsistence .............................................................................................................................................39 Civil and Political Rights Impacted by Climate Change ...........................................................................41 2 Maldives Submission under Resolution HRC 7/23 ‐ FINAL ‐‐ 25 September 2008 Right to Life .........................................................................................................................................42 The Right to Property..........................................................................................................................45 Economic, Social, and Cultural Rights Impacted by Climate Change......................................................48 The Right to Food................................................................................................................................48 The Right to Housing...........................................................................................................................51 The Right to Health .............................................................................................................................52 The Right to Water..............................................................................................................................54 The Right to Work ...............................................................................................................................56 Other Economic, Social and Cultural Rights........................................................................................59 Procedural Rights Implicated by Climate Change...................................................................................60 Right of Access to Information............................................................................................................61 Right of Participation in Decision‐Making...........................................................................................63 Right to Remedy..................................................................................................................................64 Safeguarding Rights when Responding to Climate Change ....................................................................65 Safeguarding Rights during Natural Disaster ..........................................................................................67 IV. The Role of the International Community.............................................................................................69 The Need for Further Measures to Protect and Fulfill Climate Change‐Threatened Human Rights......71 Obligations of the International Community under International Human Rights Instruments .............74 The Right of Self Determination and other Rights under the ICCPR...................................................74 The Duty to Cooperate to Achieve the Full Realization of Rights under the ICESCR..........................75 Obligations of the International Community under Customary International Human Rights Law ........78 Obligations of the International Community under International Climate Conventions.......................79 V. Conclusion and Next Steps .....................................................................................................................82 3 Maldives Submission under Resolution HRC 7/23 ‐ FINAL ‐‐ 25 September 2008 FOREWORD By H.E Mr. Abdulla Shahid, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Maldives The Maldives Government has continually reiterated that, until recently, there has been a fundamental imbalance between the attention devoted to the scientific parameters of climate change, and the attention devoted to its human costs. We believe that this weakness in the international discourse on environmental degradation is a key contributing factor behind the world’s collective failure to effectively tackle the problem. The Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) study into the relationship between human rights and climate change, called for by Human Rights Council Resolution 7/23, will be very significant in terms of redressing this imbalance. By showing definitively that climate change results in the direct and indirect violation of a wide-range of human rights, the study will help to bring the individual human face of the problem into sharper focus. This in-turn will, we believe, increase the moral and ethical imperative for world governments to act. The Maldives Government’s submission provides incontestable proof that climate change is already affecting the lives, livelihoods and rights of people across our island nation. Moreover, while our analysis is based on the experience of the Maldives and of Maldivians, it is clear that the findings are equally applicable to many other vulnerable countries around the world – countries that bear almost no responsibility for the problem that threatens to consume them. This study is an important step that has the potential to help us reach our goal of a global climate policy based on intergenerational solidarity and sustainable development. As the human consequences of climate change become more and more apparent, we look forward to working with our friends both inside and outside the Human Rights Council to explore how a rights–based approach to climate change can best contribute to moving the world from a stance of inaction to one premised on the universality and inviolability of the rights and freedoms with which we are all endowed. 4 Maldives Submission under Resolution HRC 7/23 ‐ FINAL ‐‐ 25 September 2008 EXECUTIVE SUMMARY The recently adopted Human Rights Council Resolution 7/23 and the requested study by the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights (OHCHR) on the link between human rights and climate change are an extension of long-standing international concern about the impacts of environmental harm on human rights. Climate change has significant, and at times disastrous, effects on human populations, and these impacts are expected to increase in frequency and intensity. The Republic of the Maldives, which consists of approximately
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