Respecting and protecting human rights and protecting the environment are inextricably linked. Yet while Heads of State from 88 countries have called to end siloed thinking in the Leaders Pledge for Nature, environmental policymaking still too often excludes or sidelines human rights, asserts an Open Letter from civil society to world leaders.
A broad range of indigenous peoples’ organisations, civil society groups, including human rights, environmental and conservation organisations, and human rights, land and environmental defenders, as well as academics and experts from the Global South and North have called on the world’s leaders to bring together human rights, the environment and climate in policymaking in order to secure a just, equitable and ecologically healthy world for all.
The Open Letter urged world leaders to ensure that all policymaking related to the environment – including the climate and biodiversity crises, ownership and use of land, water and resources, ecosystem degradation, corporate accountability and trade, among others – address human rights and the environment in an integrated manner. This would help to catalyse the transformative action that is urgently required.
The time to act is now, the Open Letter emphasises. “We call on you to unite human rights, climate and the environment once and for all. In doing so, you can help us and our future generations to thrive by living in harmony with nature. And in doing so, you can affirm that both nature and people have intrinsic worth and that governments are serious about living up to their duty both to protect Mother Earth and to respect, protect and fulfil human rights,” it concludes.
The full text of the Open Letter is available at:
https://www.forestpeoples.org/sites/default/files/documents/HR%20Env_signatory%20letter_english.pdf