How to repair the world: Climate justice and human rights
The fight for human rights and climate justice is always global, while individual struggles focus on specific local calamities. Indigenous communities defending the Amazon are connected in their struggle to communities in West Africa fighting to protect their rights and livelihoods. Likewise, communities in Indonesia holding the fossil fuel industry accountable for rising sea levels are advancing a cause that also benefits people as far away as the Mediterranean and the eastern seaboard of the US.
Supporting local struggles – as ECCHR does in the case of Pari Island and farming communities in Pakistan or indigenous communities in Mexico – is therefore part of a broader struggle for a different world. It is challenging the corporate and colonial logic that has caused the climate crisis by exploiting humans and nature alike; a logic that is clearly also driving carbon offsetting, many green energy and other “green transition” initiatives. Nature is once again reduced to an abstract commodity, something to be measured, traded and sold for profit, while the rights of local communities are ignored. Communities who contributed least to global warming are already now suffering its most devastating effects. They are the very people who are on the frontlines of defending forests, rivers and the land they live with. At ECCHR, we believe their struggles point towards meaningful climate action: climate, biodiversity, land rights and human rights are deeply interconnected and cannot be addressed in isolation.
Together with affected communities and partner organizations, ECCHR supports legal interventions in Europe to work towards a common goal: Accountability for the damage that has already been done to people and the earth as well as safeguarding the rights of future generations. We do believe in solidarity and in the capacity to repair, to recover and regenerate – in all forms of life. Law cannot bring this about alone, but it can play a facilitating part.
Our events during the UN Climate Change Conference 2026
13.11.2026 @ 1:15 pm / Loss and damage in practice: From climate litigation to community-led solutions / COP31, Blue zone, Side Event Room 1 - GORDIYON / Speakers: Miriam Saage-Maaß (ECCHR), state representatives from the Pacific and Scotland, representatives of transnational climate cases from Pakistan, Abdul Kalique Laghari, and Indonesia, Boy Jerry Even Sembiring, community advocates and researchers from Pacific island nations and the Bay of Bengal / Co-Organizers: ECCHR, UUSC, EDO, SDS / Supporters: CIEL, HANDS, HEKS, medico international, NTUF, Uplift, WALHI
15.11.2026 @ 3:10 pm / Follow the money – holding financial drivers of destruction of land and forest to account / Beyond COP31 Peoples’ Climate Summit, Mimar Sinan Congress Center, Hall 4 – Humus / Speakers: Representatives of Articulation of Indigenous Peoples of Brazil (APIB), Bláithin Quigley (TLC / Global Legal Action Network), Miriam Saage-Maaß (ECCHR), João Gonçalves (Mighty Earth) / Organizer: GLAN
16.11.2026 @ 1:30 pm / Who pays for loss & damage? The politics of reparations / Beyond COP31 Peoples’ Climate Summit, Mimar Sinan Congress Center, Hall 5 - Ocean / Speakers: Representatives from Nepal and Pakistan, Annabell Brüggemann (ECCHR), Karin Zennig (medico international) David Williams (Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung), Violetta Bock (Member of the German Parliament) / Organizer: Rosa Luxemburg Stiftung
16.11.2026 @ 3:45 pm/ No Climate Justice without Land Justice – Bridging Climate, Biodiversity and Human Rights / Peoples’ Climate Summit, Mimar Sinan Congress Center / Speakers: Elisa Morgera (UN Special Rapporteur for Climate Change and Human Rights) Abdul Mufeez Shaheed (Pacific Islands Students Fighting Climate Change - PISFCC), Theresa Mockel (ECCHR), other speakers tbc / Co-Organizers: ECCHR, ESCR-Net
18.11.2026 @ 1:30 pm / How to repair – from climate harm to accountability / Beyond COP31 Peoples’ Climate Summit, Mimar Sinan Congress Center, Hall 3 – Silva / Speakers: Representatives from Pari Island Case, Pakistan Climate Cost Case and Odette Case / Co-Organizers: ECCHR, medico international
19.11.2026 @ 3 pm / How courts are shaping corporate climate responsibility / COP31, Blue zone, Side Event Room 6 - KATİP ÇELEBİ / Speakers: Annabell Brüggemann (ECCHR), judges, corporate lawyers and representatives from different Bar Associations / Co-Organizers: International Bar Association (IBA), Federal Council of the Brazilian Bar Association (OAB)
Meet our team in Antalya
Annabell Brüggemann, Josephine Gäbler, Miriam Saage-Maaß, Sigrun Matthiesen, Theresa Mockel, Martha Bracklo
Contact us at cop2026@ecchr.eu if you fancy a coffee or tea with us.
