in relation to environmental protection, including preventing harm resulting from climate
change.110
The procedural duties include the following:
•
•
•
States must ensure the assessment of environmental impacts
and make environmental information public;
States must facilitate public participation in environmental
decision-making, including by protecting the rights of
expression and association; and
States must provide access to remedies for harm.111
The substantive duties on States include the following:
•
•
States must adopt and implement legal frameworks to protect
against environmental harm that may infringe on enjoyment of
human rights; and,
States must regulate private actors to protect against such
environmental harm.112
Steps must be taken by the States where the Carbon Majors are incorporated, such as
Australia, Canada, and the United States, and by the states where the harm is suffered, such as
the Philippines, to ensure that the Carbon Majors refrain from the activities that are interfering
with the rights of Filipinos. The States where the Carbon Majors are incorporated need to
adequately regulate, while the states that are acutely vulnerable to the impacts of climate change
need to monitor, assess, notify the Carbon Majors, and their states, of imminent or on-going
human rights violations, and to take further action if deemed necessary. This petition presents an
opportunity for the States where the Carbon Majors are incorporated to cooperate with the
Philippines, a State profoundly affected by climate change, and specifically with the Honourable
Commission in fully investigating this urgent matter.
7. The international law and principles discussed herein form part of the law of the land.
The 1987 Constitution provides that the Philippines “adopts the generally accepted
principles of international law as part of the law of the land.”113 Relevant to an administrative
investigation, the application of international laws specifically in litigating environmental cases
has been explained by former Supreme Court Chief Justice Renato Corona. He said:
110
Human Rights Council, Report of the Independent Expert on the Issue of Human Rights Obligations Relating to
the Enjoyment of a Safe, Clean, Healthy and Sustainable Environment, John H. Knox, Mapping Report, TwentyFifth Session, December 30 2013, at 7, ¶ 17.
111
Id. at 9-12, ¶¶ 25-33.
112
Id. at 7-9, ¶¶ 18-24.
113
CONST. art. II, § 2.
28
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