{"id":41709,"date":"2024-04-25T10:50:33","date_gmt":"2024-04-25T09:50:33","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/peggada.com\/environmental-associations-take-portugals-first-climate-litigation-case-to-the-supreme-court-of-justice\/"},"modified":"2024-05-01T21:36:53","modified_gmt":"2024-05-01T20:36:53","slug":"environmental-associations-take-portugals-first-climate-litigation-case-to-the-supreme-court-of-justice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/peggada.com\/en\/environmental-associations-take-portugals-first-climate-litigation-case-to-the-supreme-court-of-justice\/","title":{"rendered":"Environmental associations take Portugal’s first climate litigation case to the Supreme Court of Justice"},"content":{"rendered":"\t\t
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The environmental associations are considering taking the legal action to the European Court of Human Rights to force the State to do what they promised to do when the Basic Climate Law was approved.<\/strong><\/p>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t

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The climate advocacy groups \u00daltimo Recurso (Last resort)<\/a>, Quercus<\/a> and Sciaena<\/a> are taking Portugal’s first climate litigation case to the Supreme Court of Justice to ensure that the Portuguese State complies with the commitments adopted in the Basic Climate Law, a text that lays down the foundations of climate policy and came into force in February 2022.<\/span><\/p>\n

The three organizations sued the Portuguese State in November of last year (2023) for failing to comply with the law. After more than four months without a response, a complaint was lodged with the Superior Council of the Judiciary against the judge of Lisbon’s Civil Court. On the day the complaint was reported, April 12, the judge issued her ruling and rejected the petition.<\/span><\/p>\n

“The judge describes our initial petition as abstract, generic and ‘obscure’, when in reality the petition includes, point by point, all the measures of the Basic Climate Law and the corresponding deadlines that have not been met,” says Mariana Gomes, president and founder of the \u00daltimo Recurso (Last Resort) Association, in a joint statement.<\/span><\/p>\n

According to the environmental organizations, “the state has failed to implement measures such as a carbon budget, a climate action portal, a national energy and climate plan and sectoral mitigation plans, a negligence that is especially reprehensible in the wake of extreme temperatures and other unprecedented damage in the country.<\/strong> Since the lawsuit was filed, and while the judge has not ruled on it, Portugal has continued to suffer the effects of climate change, such as drought in the Algarve and extreme or higher than normal temperatures for this time of year.”<\/span><\/p>\n

“The ruling dismisses the action outright because the request formulated would be unintelligible, which is assessed in two paragraphs. It is therefore difficult to accept that the court took four months to decide,” says lawyer Ricardo S\u00e1 Fernandes, adding that the ruling “reveals a legal insensitivity and hastiness that is shocking, in clear contrast to recent decisions made by the European Court of Human Rights.”<\/span><\/p>\n

\u00daltimo Recurso, Quercus and Sciaena will appeal the decision to the Supreme Court of Justice and are considering going to the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) if necessary.<\/span><\/p>\n

“Our case is very similar to that of Grandmothers for the Climate [a case recently accepted by the ECHR, in which a group of Swiss women tried to sue the government for not doing enough to combat climate change]. And we still have the positive factor that we have the Basic Climate Law. The Grandmothers for Climate case didn’t have a specific law, it was a more abstract request,” explains Mariana Gomes.<\/span><\/p>\n

The \u00daltimo Recurso (Last Resort) Association was founded in 2022 with the aim of using legal means to hold to account those who are considered to be the main contributors to the climate crisis in Portugal. In 2023, after exhausting all non-judicial avenues, it decided to file a civil suit against the State in the Civil Court of Lisbon, which was joined by the support of Quercus and Sciaena, who jointly signed the suit, reaffirming their commitment to climate justice.<\/span><\/p>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t

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Author: Sofia Vila Flor<\/figcaption>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/figure>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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She might have chosen to study Meteorology and Oceanography, but ultimately pursued Communication. And that's fine because if they don't get their weather predictions right, she wouldn't be the one to change that. She started by looking for sustainable ideas and projects for the university, and since then, she has never stopped (who stops, really?). She loves to watch tv shows, but she watches few because she is demanding. You don't need much to convince her to embrace new, \"greener\" habits and challenges.<\/h2>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t
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You can see more of Sofia's articles here.<\/a><\/h3>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t<\/section>\n\t\t
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Related articles<\/h4>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t
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Sustainable Development Goals<\/h4>\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t
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This article addresses an action that promotes the adoption of urgent measures to fight climate change and its impacts<\/strong>. SDG 13 also aims to improve education on climate change mitigation and impact reduction.<\/p>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t

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\"\u27a1\ufe0f\" To discover businesses that are actively working to contribute to this Sustainable Development Goal, click here<\/a>.<\/h5>\n
\"\u27a1\ufe0f\" To read news, interviews or tips related to this Goal, click here<\/a>.<\/strong><\/h5>\n
\u27a1\ufe0f Want to know more about the 17 United Nations Sustainable Development Goals? Click here<\/a><\/h5>\n
<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t\t\t<\/div>\n\t\t","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The environmental associations are considering taking the legal action to the European Court of Human Rights to force the State to do what they promised to do when the Basic Climate Law was approved. The climate advocacy groups \u00daltimo Recurso (Last resort), Quercus and Sciaena are taking Portugal’s first climate litigation case to the Supreme […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":41625,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[540],"tags":[3825,3826,3008,2117,3009],"class_list":["post-41709","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-news","tag-court","tag-quercus-en","tag-sdg-13","tag-sofia-vila-flor-en","tag-sustainable-development-goal-13"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/peggada.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41709","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/peggada.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/peggada.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peggada.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peggada.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=41709"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/peggada.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/41709\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peggada.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/41625"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/peggada.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=41709"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peggada.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=41709"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/peggada.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=41709"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}