Articles: Australia

The Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) in 2014 unequivocally confirmed that greenhouse gas emissions are the primary cause of climate change. This, it determined would result in extreme weather events and natural disasters, rising sea-levels, floods, heat waves, droughts, desertification, food and water shortages, and the spread of tropical and vector-borne diseases as some of the adverse impacts of climate change.

In May 2019 a group of eight Torres Strait Islanders, who are Australian citizens, with legal representation from Client Earth, submitted a claim to the UN Human Rights Committee (UNHRC). They allege that Australia is failing its legal human rights obligations to Torres Strait Islanders because it has failed to take adequate action to reduce emissions or to provide for proper adaptation measures on the islands.