With AO-32/25, the IACtHR has delivered a historic and bold affirmation that climate change is not only an environmental emergency but also a profound human rights crisis, one that requires both prevention and reparation. By articulating States’ duties to provide remedies, the IACtHR has moved the conversation to one of legal accountability and remediation.
On July 3, 2025, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACtHR) published its long-awaited Advisory Opinion 32/25 (AO-32/25). The Opinion responds to a 2023 request from Colombia and Chile, asking the IACtHR to clarify the scope of States’ obligations to address the climate emergency under international human rights law. While the decision marks a significant step toward recognizing the climate crisis as a human rights issue, this blog post aims to shed light on a critical omission in the IACtHR’s reasoning: the impact of environmental degradation and the climate emergency on sexual and reproductive health and rights.
The Inter-American Court of Human Rights’ (IACtHR) advisory opinion on human rights and the climate emergency (AO-32/25) addresses numerous dimensions of the climate crisis, setting an important precedent for the protection of our planet. This post focuses on one particularly significant development: the IACtHR’s recognition of Nature as a subject of rights. We argue that the IACtHR’s pronouncements on this subject mark the advent of an ecocentric paradigm whose implications are likely to be far-reaching and transformative.
This post focuses on one notable aspect of AO-32/25 that has not received attention in other commentary–the IACtHR’s engagement with gender issues. We find that the IACtHR has taken an important step forward, both in recognizing gender as a key determinant of climate vulnerability and in identifying gender-responsive obligations on States. However, the IACtHR’s comments in this regard remain general and often gestural. The obligations identified are limited, narrow, and many relate to data gathering rather than substantial action.
While there are many aspects of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACtHR)’s Advisory Opinion 32/25 (AO-32/25) that are new and groundbreaking, the inclusion of a reflection on jus cogens might have surprised some observers. The legal consequences of the recognition as jus cogens of the obligation not to create irreversible damage to the climate and the global environment are profound. Treaties violating the norm are void, customary international law rules cannot exist, nor does the persistent objector rule apply.
The Inter-American Court of Human Rights’ (IACtHR) Advisory Opinion OC-32/25 on the “Climate Emergency and Human Rights” represents a transformative moment in international legal doctrine on climate-induced displacement and shows why the IACtHR’s conclusions constitute not merely an incremental development, but a fundamental reorientation of the human rights law approach to one of the most pressing challenges of our time.
On July 3, 2025, the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACtHR) issued Advisory Opinion No. 32—the most important and progressive document yet released by an international court on the climate crisis. The IACtHR’s findings are as comprehensive as they are groundbreaking, spanning areas from procedural requirements for mitigation measures to the protection of environmental defenders. This post launches a blog symposium on the advisory opinion and discusses ten key takeaways, chosen to illustrate the opinion’s legal and practical significance.
On 2 May 2025, the Pan African Lawyers Union – in collaboration with the African Climate Platform, the Environmental Lawyers Collective for Africa, Natural Justice, and resilient40 – submitted a request to the African Court on Human and Peoples’ Rights for an advisory opinion on States’ obligations in relation to climate change. As the climate crisis intensifies across the continent, exacerbating inequality, displacing communities, and threatening ecological systems, the need for principled, coherent, and rights-based legal guidance has never been greater. In addressing this request, the Court has the chance not only to align with emerging global jurisprudence but to contribute a distinctly African vision of climate justice.
On April 10 2025 AG Norkus delivered his Opinion in the appeal of Hamoudi v Frontex (Case C-136/24). In it, he tackles a question that is pivotal not only for Mr. Hamoudi’s right to compensation but also for the evolution of the EU legal system: how should the CJEU address stark power imbalances in evidentiary matters? In formulating EU procedural rules for cases involving collective expulsions, the CJEU should take into account the blatant asymmetry in accessing evidence existing between asylum seekers adrift at sea and an EU Agency equipped with cutting-edge surveillance technology. Yet, the reasoning of the AG on the allocation of the burden of proof misfires in some crucial respects.
On December 13, 2024, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) concluded the hearings of the advisory proceedings on State obligations in respect of Climate Change. On the last day of the hearings, judges posed four questions to participants to be answered within a one-week timeframe. The Judges enquired about State obligations in relation to fossil fuels; the interpretation of Article 4 of the Paris Agreement; the content of the right to a clean, healthy, and sustainable environment; and the significance of declarations made by some States on becoming parties to the UN climate treaties. This blog post will provide a brief exploration of the first two questions and issues raised.
13. September 2025
Giovanni Capoccia
12. September 2025
Anne Peters
12. September 2025
Anne Peters