The response to the world’s highest court’s opinion that countries do have have a responsibility to limit climate harm are still coming in.

Dr Dean Bialek, a leading international lawyer and former climate diplomat who worked for nearly ten years as a lead negotiator with the world’s island nations on the Paris Agreement said the ICJ’s advisory opinion was “an unusually robust statement clarifying the legal obligations of states on climate change and the regulation of the greenhouse gas emissions that are causing it”

The Court has confirmed the primacy of the 1.5C temperature goal enshrined in the Paris Agreement as the north star for the international response to climate change, and the obligation on states to pitch their emissions targets well within its guardrails.

“This is hugely significant at a time when the Australian Government is in final deliberations on its emissions target for 2035, which the best science says needs to be in the mid-to-high 70’s per cent reduction below 2005 levels to be 1.5C-aligned  

For the first time, the ICJ opinion says countries can be held internationally liable for failing to do their bit on climate, focusing most intently on the failures implicit in any new approvals for fossil fuel projects or subsidies to make them cheaper.  

“To me, this makes inescapable the need to embed a climate trigger within efforts to reform Australia’s environmental laws”