UN Proclaims Access to Clean Environment a New Fundamental Right
Do we have the right to live in a clean environment? Here is your answer!
Every citizen on this planet has the right to live but that very right is taken over when we have no choice but to live in an unhealthy environment. With regards to this problem, the United Nations acknowledged a new fundamental right. Recently, the UN Human Rights Council declared access to a clean and healthy environment as a fundamental right.
The resolution was discussed once before in the 1990s and this time it received tremendous support. Although some countries including the United States and Britain criticized the lead-up, UK ended up voting in the favor of the resolution.
Image: Josue Mulala/UNICEF
David Boyd, the UN special rapporteur on human rights and the environment, who called the decision a “historic breakthrough”, further added;
This has life-changing potential in a world where the global environmental crisis causes more than nine million premature deaths every year.
Proposed by Costa Rica, the Maldives, Morocco, Slovenia and Switzerland, the text was passed with 43 votes in favor followed by four abstentious from Russia, India, China and Japan.
Costa Rica’s ambassador, Catalina Devandas Aguilar, mentioned that the decision would benefit and will provide a glimmer of hope to the developing communities along with the victims of climate change.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO) around 24.3 percent of deaths from the global total happen because of environmental risks such as air pollution.
Another offer recommended by the Marshall Islands to make a new special rapporteur on climate change was also accepted by the Council on the same day. This resolution would definitely work as one of the weapons against environmental degradation and climate crisis.
Via: UN News
