is important to note that on the facts before the Commission, which include the deaths of many Filipinos, there can be no doubt that violations of civil and political rights, notably the right to life, are implicated here. The petitioners appropriately rely upon the business responsibility to respect rights in the UN Guiding Principles to claim that the investor-owned Carbon Majors have breached their responsibilities to the people and communities of the Philippines by “directly or indirectly contributing to current or future adverse human rights impacts through the extraction and sale of fossil fuels and activities undermining climate action”.22 Here reference is made to Principle 13 which provides that businesses are to: “(a) Avoid causing or contributing to adverse human rights impacts through their own activities, and address such impacts when they occur; [and] (b) Seek to prevent or mitigate adverse human rights impacts that are directly linked to their operations, products or services by their business relationships, even if they have not contributed to these impacts.” The petitioners then turn, appropriately, to Principle 17 of the Guiding Principles, which provides that businesses should “carry out human rights due diligence” in order to “identify, prevent, mitigate and account for how they address their adverse human rights impacts.”23 Here, the petitioners claim that the Carbon Majors have breached their responsibility to respect rights by “failing to prevent human rights impacts that are directly linked to their operations, products, or services by its business relationships.” While the importance of human rights due diligence has been recognized by the oil and gas industry with regard to respect for local community and indigenous rights, tools for the assessment of human rights impacts associated with climate change do not yet appear to have been incorporated into industry guidance.24 In light of existing knowledge about fossil fuels and climate change, a business as usual approach appears entirely inconsistent with the identification and prevention of human rights impacts following an effective due diligence process as contemplated by the UN Guiding Principles. As noted by the petitioners, the conduct of the Carbon Majors risks further human rights violations due to “long-term investments based on a scenario in which global consumption of fossil fuels continues to grow, thus warming the earth Extractive Industries: Environmental Law and Standards” Human Rights Law and the Extractive Industries, Paper No. 12, Page No. 12-1 – 12-42 (Rocky Mt. Min. L. Fdn. 2016). 22 Petition at 19. 23 Petition at 21. 24 See for example the human rights due diligence guidance of the industry association IPIECA, online: http://www.ipieca.org/publication/human-rights-due-diligence-process-practical-guideimplementation-oil-and-gas-companies ; see also OECD Secretariat, OECD Due Diligence Guidance for Meaningful Stakeholder Engagement in the Extractive Sector, (2016), online: https://mneguidelines.oecd.org/OECD-Guidance-Extractives-Sector-StakeholderEngagement.pdf 6