Dear Colleagues,

Registration for the 2016 IUCN Academy of Environmental Law Colloquium which will take place at the University of Oslo, Norway, June 22-24, is now open at: http://iucnael2016.no

The topic of the 2016 Colloquium is “The Environment in Court”. This broad topic seeks to address procedural and substantive aspects of environmental adjudication, both in international, national and regional courts, tribunals and panels as well as compliance mechanisms of multilateral environmental treaties.

Many of the speakers will focus on various aspects of climate change related litigation. Please find the tentative programme here: http://iucnael2016.no/programme-2

On Tuesday, 21 June 2016, a special pre-colloquium session will be held on: Limiting Dangerous Climate Change: The Emerging Importance of Domestic Courts and Human Rights Tribunals – Especially After Paris

2015 witnessed significant and successful use of domestic courts and a national human rights commission to limit climate change emissions and impacts. This special session will focus on why domestic litigation on three continents has been successful, as well as on the prospects for similar litigation in other jurisdictions, particularly in light of the December 2015 Paris Climate Agreement. Those attending will have a unique opportunity to hear from and discuss these issues with the key jurists involved in these cases:

– from The Netherlands – Roger Cox, the Dutch Attorney who successfully argued the case for the Urgenda Foundation, in which the Court of the Hague found the Dutch government owed a tort duty of care to its citizens requiring the government to rein in carbon emissions by 25% by 2020;

– from Pakistan – Hon. Syed Mansoor Ali Shah, the Lahore High Court Green Bench Judge who, acting on the complaint of one citizen, found that the Pakistan government had a constitutional duty to protect citizens from climate impacts and ordered the government to take concrete measures to do so

– from the United States – Andrea Rodgers, Attorney for Our Childrens’ Trust plaintiffs, who convinced an Oregon state court that the state government had a public trust duty to ensure its greenhouse gas emission standards are sufficiently stringent to protect children from the burden of future GHG emissions;

– from the Philippines – Zelda dT Soriano, an attorney for Philippine citizens who in 2015 succeeded in having the Philippines Human Right Commission agree to investigate their complaint alleging that large private carbon companies located in other countries have responsibility

This special session will be chaired by veteran environmental attorney David Estrin and is being presented by the Centre for International Governance Innovation’s International Law Research Program.

 We look forward to your participation at the 2016 IUCNAEL Colloquium in Oslo!

Professor Dr. Christina Voigt

Chair of the Organizing Committee for the 14th IUCNAEL Colloquium

University of Oslo, Faculty of Law, Department of Public and International Law/ Pluricourts – Center of Excellence