72 These principles must be similarly applied and operationalized when addressing climate change. Thus, States have the procedural obligation to: 1. Provide the public with accessible, affordable, and understandable information regarding the causes and consequences of the global climate crisis, including incorporating climate change into the educational curriculum at all levels; 2. Ensure an inclusive, equitable, and gender-based approach to public participation in all climate-related actions, with a particular emphasis on empowering the most affected populations, namely women, children, young people, indigenous peoples and local communities, persons living in poverty, persons with disabilities, older persons, migrants, displaced people, and other potentially at-risk communities; 3. Enable affordable and timely access to justice and effective remedies for all, to hold States and businesses accountable for fulfilling their climate change obligations; 4. Assess the potential climate change and human rights impacts of all plans, policies, and proposals, including both upstream and downstream effects (i.e., both production- and consumption-related emissions); 5. Integrate gender equality into all climate actions, enabling women to play leadership roles; 6. Respect the rights of indigenous peoples in all climate actions, particularly their right to free, prior, and informed consent; and 7. Provide strong protection for environmental and human rights defenders working on climate-related issues, from land use to fossil fuels. States must vigilantly protect defenders from harassment, intimidation, and violence.358 Moreover, States have the substantive obligation to: 1. Abstain from all actions that infringe on a person’s basic human rights as a result of their environmental consequences; 2. Establish climate change mitigation programs and implement punitive laws against environmental harm to protect basic human 358 Safe Climate Report, supra note 327, at 30.