Switzerland must do more to prove it's complying with landmark climate change decision 

(CN) — The Swiss government has not yet proven it is meeting the requirements set out in a historic climate change decision at Europe’s top rights court, the court’s oversight body said on Friday.

The Council of Ministers of the Council of Europe, which oversees the implementation of judgments from the European Court of Human Rights, asked Switzerland to provide more information about adaptation and mitigation measures.

In April 2024, the European Court of Human Rights sided with a group of senior Swiss women who argued their government violated their rights by failing to protect them from the impact of a warming planet in the first international court decision on climate change.

“The court has now confirmed to us that we are right and … they have not done enough in Switzerland,” Pia Hollendstein told Courthouse News after the ruling. The 73-year-old is a board member of the Senior Women for Climate Protection, which lodged the complaint with the Strasbourg-based court.

Founded in 1959, the court governs the European Convention on Human Rights, which protects the civil and political rights of Europeans.

In October, Switzerland asked for the case to be closed, arguing it had done enough to meet the requirements of the decision. The request went to representatives from the foreign ministries of the Council of Europe’s 46 member states who make up the Council of Ministers. The group meets quarterly to assess the implementation of judgments.

The women were happy with the outcome.

“Switzerland must improve its climate policy to remedy the violation of our human rights. We call on the Federal Council and Parliament to take global warming seriously and to finally take decisive action against the climate crisis,” said Rosmarie Wydler-Wälti, co-president of Senior Women for Climate Protection and one of the applicants in the case.

Environmental groups have heralded the decision as a win for the planet.

“The decision of the Council of Europe makes clear that the Swiss Federal Council must fulfill its legal obligation to protect its citizens’ human rights by ramping up its climate ambition. The Committee of Ministers stressed that the Swiss government must provide objective evidence demonstrating that its policies are adequate to address both current and potentially irreversible future climate impacts,” Sébastien Duyck, a lawyer at the Center for International Environmental Law, said in a statement.

The Swiss case is just one of the legal battles to be waged over climate change. Climate activists in the Netherlands and Germany have succeeded in bringing cases against their governments for failing to act. The Dutch Supreme Court ordered the government to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in 2019, in the landmark Urgenda decision.

Last year, the United Nation’s highest court, the International Court of Justice, held hearings on climate change after the U.N. General Assembly asked for advice on the country’s legal obligations. That decision is expected later this year.

Switzerland can present its evidence when the Council of Ministers meets again in September.

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