Climate change : the human rights implications for small islands developing states

Abstract

Microsoft Word - Climate Change paper 2006 slade.docSecond International Symposium for the Laureates of the Elizabeth Haub Prizes for Environmental Law and for Environmental Diplomacy 20-22 September 2006, Murnau, Germany Climate Change: The Human Rights Implications for Small Island Developing States A paper by Tuiloma Neroni Slade For close to twenty years now, the world's leading scientists and other experts working through the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC) have sent the international community a consistent and increasingly worrying message: burgeoning human activity is gradually thickening the layer of atmosphere that keeps our planet warm. Continuing the current pattern of greenhouse gas emissions will increase global average temperatures to levels and at rates previously unknown to humankind. Rising temperatures will lead to rising seas, as water expands and the ice caps recede. The IPCC Second Assessment Report in 1995 declared that there is now strong