Date: 24 July 2025
Time: 5:30pm CEST, 3:30am Fiji time (next day)
Format: Online/Hybrid
Location: The Carlton Ambassador, The Hague
Rewatch the event: here
On 23 July 2025, the International Court of Justice (ICJ) delivers its long-awaited Advisory Opinion (AO) on the obligations of States in respect of climate change.
This historic ruling follows years of coordinated legal mobilisation by Pacific Island students, the world’s youth, lawyers, and allied States, culminating in an extraordinary global engagement with 96 States and 11 international organisations participating in the oral hearings.
Building on a growing jurisprudence that includes the 2023 Advisory Opinion by the International Tribunal for the Law of the Sea (ITLOS) and the 2024 Opinion by the Inter-American Court of Human Rights (IACtHR), the ICJ AO has the potential to be a defining moment for climate justice and international law.
This webinar, co-convened by the Government of Vanuatu, Alliance of Small Island States, UN Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights, World’s Youth for Climate Justice (WYCJ), Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL), and Pacific Islands Students Fighting Climate Change (PISFCC), will bring together high-level and authoritative legal and political voices to offer a rapid, top-line analysis of the AO’s implications ensuring a clear human rights and justice-oriented understanding of the Court’s opinion reaches global audiences.
Opening Remarks: H.E. Ambassador Odo Tevi (Vanuatu)
Speakers include:
Julian Aguon, Blue Ocean Law
Margaretha Wewerinke-Singh, University of Amsterdam
Coral Pasisi, Pacific Community
Kate Wilson, Department of Sustainable Development, Saint Lucia
Benjamin Schachter, Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights
Bryce Rudyk, AOSIS
Jennifer Robinson, Doughty Street Chambers
With Mary Robinson, Chair of The Elders, former President of Ireland and the former UN High Commissioner on Human Rights.
