Is U.S. Global Warming Pollution Violating Human Rights Law?

While the rest of the world debated global warming, Roy Nageak watched the ice melt and recede in his Arctic backyard. Nageak, an Inuit, lives in the northernmost settlement in Alaska. Growing up, he recalls that there was "always ice."

"There were great pads of ice that were solid and many feet thick," Nageak said.

But Nageak and other Inuit, who live a world away from burning smokestacks and traffic jams are among the first victims of global warming. And human rights groups say the Inuit case mirrors the plight of other populations around the globe who are expected to face the ramifications of climate change sooner, and more harshly, than the countries most responsible for the gases linked to global warming.

"Now, we are lucky to get four feet of ice because of what is happening outside our region," Nageak said. "It's a lifestyle that is prevalent in another society that is so far away from us, and it's affecting our way of life."

A 2004 Arctic Climate Impact Assessment by international scientists found that "climate changes are being experienced particularly intensely in the Arctic" and that the "Inuit face major threats to their food security and hunting cultures."

Nageak joined 62 other Inuit in Alaska and Canada in 2005 to hold the world's most-notorious polluter accountable. They filed a petition against the United States with the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights -- one of the bodies set up to promote and protect human rights in the Americas.

The petition argues that the impacts of climate change caused by the U.S. violate the human rights of the Inuit. The Inuit say their livelihoods, their spiritual life and their cultural identity are threatened because of the greenhouse-gas emissions of the United States and the government's failure to curb the damage. "We offer our testimony as a warning to humanity that while global warming has hit Arctic peoples first, changes are coming for everyone."

Last week, the Commission held a one-hour hearing to investigate the relationship between human rights and climate change in North and South America.

In a letter to the Commission, Sheila Watt-Cloutier, former director of the Inuit Circumpolar Council leading the Inuit charge, listed many of the ways climate change has jeopardized the Inuit way of life: "Because of the loss of ice and snow, communities have become isolated from one another; hunting, travel and other subsistence activities have become more dangerous or impossible; drinking-water sources have been jeopardized; [and] many coastal communities are already threatened or being forced to relocate."

In a statement to the press, Watt-Cloutier said, "We offer our testimony as a warning to humanity that, while global warming has hit Arctic peoples first, changes are coming for everyone."

Although the Inuit are the first indigenous population to make such a formal claim, human-rights activists say that as the impacts of climate change increase, so too will its toll on human life. And with it, they warn, will come populations seeking redress from the world's big polluters. "As the causal link becomes clearer ... between climate change and specific injuries, we're going to see people that are injured looking for justice somewhere."

"I don't think there's any doubt we'll see more of this," said David Hunter, a senior advisor of the Center for International Environmental Law (CIEL). "As the causal link becomes clearer... between climate change and specific injuries, we're going to see people that are injured looking for justice somewhere." CIEL, along with the law firm Earthjustice, worked with the Inuit to submit the petition.

Inequities

Growing up in the Arctic, Roy Nageak's father taught him how to fish and hunt on the ice. Nageak always expected to do the same for his son, but climate change has made the ice thinner and less predictable, and the animals and fish they hunt more elusive.