Photo from The Guardian by Sergei Grits/AP.

On September 10, 2024, Global Witness highlighted: “At least 1,500 defenders have been killed since the adoption of the Paris Agreement on 12 December 2015” at the conclusion of the COP21 climate conference.

In October 2019, just prior to the COP25 conference in Madrid, PBI-Canada amplified at an Extinction Rebellion protest in Ottawa that Global Witness had reported that 164 land and environmental defenders killed in 2018.

Despite this and the 439 land and environmental defenders killed in the two years preceding COP26 in Scotland in 2021, the 200 defenders killed in the year prior to COP27 in Egypt, and the 177 defenders killed before COP28 in the United Arab Emirates, there has not been a single reference to land and environmental defenders in the final texts emerging from these COP conferences.

Possible language

In 2019, the United Nations Human Rights Council affirmed: “Human rights defenders, including environmental human rights defenders, must be ensured a safe and enabling environment to undertake their work free from hindrance and insecurity, in recognition of their important role in supporting States to fulfil their obligations under the Paris Agreement.”

And yet this 42-word sentence has not made its way into the final text of any of the subsequent COP climate conference final texts.

COP29 in Azerbaijan

Now, COP29 will take place on November 11-22, 2024, in Baku, Azerbaijan, in the context of 196 defenders killed in 2023.

Just a few days into COP29, November 14 will mark the two-month anniversary of the murder of Guapinol River defender Juan Lopez in Honduras. He opposed the Los Pinares mining megaproject that involves the construction of a heavily-polluting petroleum coke-burning thermoelectric plant.

Thunberg will not be at COP29

With COP29 to start about a week from now, Swedish activist Greta Thunberg has stated that she will not attend this conference.

Her assessment: “We can’t legitimize COP meetings in their current form. …The only thing that will come out of it is loopholes, more negotiations, and symbolic decisions that look good on paper but are really just greenwashing.”

Thunberg adds: “Every time those in power get a chance to act, they choose not to and instead listen to industries that destroy the planet and violate human rights, rather than doing what’s right. I want to spread awareness, focus on grassroots activism, and support those who are trying to make a difference.”

Canadian opposition parties won’t attend

CBC now reports: “Most of the opposition parties on Parliament Hill are ditching the high-profile annual United Nations conference on climate change this year, citing human rights concerns in the host country Azerbaijan little more than a year after the mass exodus of nearly 120,000 ethnic Armenians from their homes in the once-disputed territory of Nagorno-Karabakh.”

“In statements sent to CBC News, the NDP and the Bloc Québécois also said they are not sending any representatives to the conference.”

The article adds: “In a statement issued last week, [Canadian environment minister Steven] Guilbeault’s office told CBC News no decision has been made yet ‘but it is most likely the minister will be able to attend.’”

UN Special Rapporteurs call for inclusion

United Nations Special Rapporteurs including Mary Lawlor and Michel Forst, have also noted: “While COPs should be an exemplary United Nations (UN)-led model for the safe participation of environmental defenders in international forums relating to the environment and climate change, each year environmental defenders face significant challenges for their efforts to have their voices heard in these forums.”

They add: “In demanding government action – and protesting against inaction – to address pollution, biodiversity loss and climate change, or where opposing large scale projects, including those meant to foster the energy transition such as mega dams, photovoltaic panels’ fields, or lithium mines, environmental defenders are exposed to grave risks. While the nature and levels of risks vary between countries and regions, on all continents they are increasing at a fast pace, and come from both State and non-State actors, including private companies. Among environmental defenders, small-scale and subsistence farmers, indigenous communities, women, youth, the elderly and working-class defenders are particularly at risk.”

Their statement concludes: “Environmental defenders must be properly listened to, and their words acted upon. There is no time to lose.”

Looking ahead to COP30 in Brazil

At a PBI-Canada organized webinar in December 2023 on COP28, Global Witness policy advisory Javier Garate commented: “There are big plans for organizing a parallel COP of civil society and I think it is a huge opportunity for all of us to work together towards COP30 in Brazil with all the energy to put the issues of local communities, Indigenous communities, land and environmental defenders that need to be at the centre of this conversation and to demand as we talk about climate solutions and the fight against climate change that the work, the protection, and the struggle of local communities has to be at the center of those conversations.”

Garate added: “We look forward to engaging in that parallel summit in Belém do Pará, Brazil in 2025 and share the concern that it is still two years away and that on average a land and environmental defender is killed every two days.”

While there may be little optimism about the upcoming COP29 conference in Azerbaijan, we will continue to follow it and see if a momentum does develop around COP30 that will take place November 10–21, 2025.

Further reading: Did the COP16 Biodiversity conference in Colombia make progress on the protection of environmental defenders? (PBI-Canada, November 2, 2024).

Photo: Lina Robles- Publimetro COP16: “their spirits are still alive”, activists protested the murder of environmental leaders in the Blue Zone.

The United Nations COP16 Biodiversity conference in Cali, Colombia that began on October 21 concluded on the morning of November 2.

The Guardian explains: “A global summit on halting the destruction of nature ended in disarray on Saturday, with some breakthroughs but key issues left unresolved. …Negotiations were due to finish on Friday evening but ended in confusion on Saturday morning after almost 12 hours of talks.”

On November 1, Publimetro reported: “Amid shouts and chants, dozens of environmental activists raised their voices in the Blue Zone [where the official COP16 negotiations take place] to reject the lack of protection faced by environmental leaders.”

That article adds: “In the main square of the event, protesters expressed their discontent with the negotiators, noting that despite the discussions, no concrete agreements have been reached to stop these killings. Many of these leaders in their territories feel threatened and without sufficient protection.”

Devdiscourse also reported: “Negotiations at COP16 included proposals for tracking killings of those safeguarding the environment. …Critics like Natalia Gomez, EarthRights’ climate policy advisor, argue existing measures are inadequate.”

And at the beginning of the talks, Michel Forst, the UN Special Rapporteur on environmental defenders, commented: “If despite the efforts made by Colombia, Brazil and other allies of defenders, some States are reluctant and say no, [given decisions are made by consensus] the final document will not contain anything about the rights of environmental defenders, which for me is a failure. But not a failure of Colombia, but of powerful actors who might have the possibility of influencing others to include clear language and wording on human rights in the final documentary.”

Will 30×30 put more land defenders at risk?

The Associated Press further notes: “The COP16 summit hosted in Cali, Colombia, was a follow-up to the historic 2022 accord in Montreal, which includes 23 measures to save Earth’s plant and animal life, including putting 30% of the planet and 30% of degraded ecosystems under protection by 2030.”

In August 2021, 49 organizations expressed concern with this initiative: “While protecting at least 30% of the planet’s land and oceans by 2030 is on its face a worthy goal of responding to biodiversity loss, the Framework’s focus on ‘protected areas’ will likely continue to lead to human rights abuses across the globe.”

One of the signatories, the Swift Foundation, says: “How it’s working right now is a militarized form of conservation. You have guards with guns, people imposing fines, building fences and kicking people out of their traditional lands. And if communities react in defense they are perceived as anti-conservation.”

In November 2022, the Honduran Black Fraternal Organization (OFRANEH) tweeted: “30×30 will be taken to COP15 by conservation multinationals intensifying pressure on the territory of indigenous peoples. Honduras for 30 years has militarized the Cayos Cochinos and the Cuero y Salado Wildlife Refuge, resulting in multiple human rights violations.”

Earlier that year, they also tweeted: “The #30×30 without real recognition of the right to prior, free and informed consultation, supposed conservation becomes dispossession and violations of human rights, as has happened in the case of Cayos Cochinos, where since 1993 the expulsion of Garífunas has been promoted.”

Artificial intelligence, a new weapon against defenders

Along with a lack of progress on protection for environmental defenders, there are new threats on the horizon.

An article in Mongabay notes: “[Forst also] says that there is a growing pattern of attacks against environmental and territorial defenders, ‘using increasingly sophisticated technological means that we were not used to in the past.’ Forst also told Mongabay Latam that not only is justice turning to artificial intelligence, but criminals are using it to fabricate videos, audios and other false information to discredit environmental defenders. ‘It’s an issue that we still don’t know how to deal with effectively.’”

Biodiversity credits

Biodiversity credits are also seen as problematic.

Contra Corriente reports: “[At COP16] the proposal for biodiversity credits as one of the mechanisms to restore ecosystems by 2030 has sparked intense debate. In Honduras, similar initiatives faced complaints of irregularities and rejection by indigenous peoples and environmentalists, who argue that this measure privileges corporations and markets. Indigenous advocates also urge that summit discussions not only focus on protecting nature, but also on guaranteeing the rights of communities.”

Bertha Zúniga of the Civic Council of Popular and Indigenous Organizations of Honduras (COPINH) and Rony Castillo of OFRANEH disagree with biodiversity credits.

Zuniga says: “It is horrible that now the forests of the communities, their biodiversity and their richness, including culture, are being converted into an environmental service available to the market. [COPINH has] always claimed in the communities that they are life and not profit, and that forests, rivers, or biodiversity cannot be merchandise; this continues to be a false environmental solution.”

And Castillo says: “[Biodiversity credits are] one more tool of dispossession.”

A new Indigenous G9

There may be some room for optimism.

The Inter Press Service further reports: “Indigenous leaders from the Amazon formed a new coalition of indigenous peoples [at COP16]. The indigenous members of this new Group of Nine (G9) demand an end to mining and deforestation, obtain direct financing and consolidate the titling of their lands.”

This Group of Nine could help to advance the agenda for the protection of Indigenous land and territorial defenders.

A new permanent body for Indigenous peoples

CGTN also reports COP16 concluded with three major agreements.

They note: “Susana Muhamad, Colombia’s Minister of Environment and Sustainable Development and the chair of this conference, announced that the three agreements are: the creation of a subsidiary body for Indigenous peoples of Africa and local communities; recognition of people of African descent as guardians of biodiversity under the Convention; and the establishment of a work plan for communities through 2030.”

Reuters adds: “Countries at the U.N. COP16 summit on nature on [November 1] approved a measure to create a permanent body for Indigenous peoples to consult on United Nations decisions about nature conservation. The consultative body is considered a breakthrough in recognizing the role that Indigenous peoples play in conserving nature globally, including some of the most biodiverse areas of the planet, according to Indigenous and environmental advocates.”

The next COPs

Now that COP16 biodiversity conference has concluded, next up is the COP29 climate conference that will take place from November 11 to 22 in Azerbaijan. Following that, the next round of negotiations on the Binding Treaty on business and human rights will take place from December 16 to 20 in Geneva.

The Guardian has also noted that given COP16 ending in “disarray” that “countries will need to continue the talks next year at an interim meeting in Bangkok.”

That would presumably be before the COP30 climate conference that will take place on November 10 to 21 in Belém, Brazil.

Just prior to COP28, Global Witness highlighted that at least 1,390 land and environmental defenders had been killed since COP21 in December 2015.

The key question remains: What can be done to stop the killings, threats against, and harassment, criminalization and judicialization of environmental defenders and uphold the land, water and territories they protect?

We continue to follow all these processes.

Further reading: PBI-Canada hosts webinar on UN COP and Binding Treaty processes and the protection of environmental defenders (October 25, 2024).

On October 24, Peace Brigades International-Canada held a webinar focused on the United Nations COP16 biodiversity conference in Colombia, the upcoming negotiations in Geneva on the UN Binding Treaty on business and human rights, and the crucial protection needs of environmental defenders.

Target 22 of the framework being negotiated at COP16 pledges: “the full protection of environmental human rights defenders.” The draft of the Binding Treaty says: “State Parties shall adopt appropriate legislative, regulatory, and other measures to … protect the safety of human rights defenders, journalists, workers, members of indigenous peoples, among others, as well as those who may be subject to retaliation.”

Can UN processes fulfill these promises? What do the negotiations look like? What are the challenges and obstacles?

Our panel commenting on these questions was Michel Forst, Berenice Celeita, Javier Garate and Yannick Wild. The webinar was moderated by Meera Karunananthan, a member of the PBI-Canada Board of Directors.

Michel Forst

Michel Forst is the UN Special Rapporteur on Environmental Defenders (Aarhus Convention). He joined us from Cali, Colombia.

Forst highlighted that it was important for him to be at COP16 “simply to show solidarity with those who are currently heavily pushing for concrete results.”

He added: “There are people who are willing to push for good results and at the same time we know that we also have people who are not our allies who are pushing also for counter-results and trying to delete paragraphs and good wording that some of us, some of them, would like to introduce.”

Forst also mentioned that he spent time in the Green Zone. This is the area outside the main conference venue for communities and NGOs, distinct from the Blue Zone where member countries and accredited observers hold their official bilateral and multilateral meetings and negotiations.

He commented: “People invited to participate say that they are not in fact feeling they are participating rightly in the discussion, being relegated in the Green Zone. Many shared with me mixed feelings about COP16, they do recognize that Colombia has made concrete efforts to prepare a more inclusive and a more participatory COP process, but at the same time the challenge the way discussions are organized, many of them feel not respected and their voices are not heard when they try to introduce new language in the outcome document, when they are meeting with delegations to try to push for wording, then we have the same usual suspects who block the discussions.”   

Berenice Celeita

Berenice Celeita is the president of the PBI-Colombia accompanied Association for Research and Social Action (Nomadesc) based in Cali.

Celeita noted: “So much has been said by the government in relation to the importance that the agreement of the COP reflects the historic fight to defend life, and understanding that life is not just being alive, for us it is essential that there is respect for culture, and respect for culture is protecting the rivers, biodiversity, the common goods and the natural goods that exist in our large home.”

She added: “For us, the division between the green zone and the blue zone shows what has historically been the massive negative leadership model because they are not thinking about the future of the planet or those people defending the planet.”

Celeita highlighted: “We feel that the 23 goals are just a theory because in practice we’ve seen in the last three decades in our country the murder of at least 30,000 defenders of land, they aren’t always called human rights defenders. This is a first element of debate, who is considered by the decision-makers, who is or is not a defender.”

She then commented: “We are being very sincere when we say that the blue zone is a business negotiation space, they are taking about past business plans and the renewal of agreements, they are still talking about carrying out large-scale mining, hydroelectric dams, and other pilot projects related to fracking which all have negative impacts on nature.”

Celeita also asked: “What is the next step after the COP? What are the true commitments to take care of our Mother Earth and to defend her? To protect and take care of life? And to take care of culture?”

Javier Garate

Javier Garate is the Washington, DC-based US Policy Advisor on Land and Environmental Defenders at Global Witness. He joined us from the Nomadesc office in Cali.

Garate noted: “We are clearly seeing that this COP is important, but that there are multiple COPs and that is something that is very visible here and the other COPs we have participated, this is not the exception. We see that there are thousands of events, but at the same time there is a very select and small group and the majority of them we don’t even really who they are, and we see their areas where the doors are closed and we can’t go in, and those are the spaces where the negotiations are taking place.”

He added: “On one hand there is a beautiful rich conversation with broad participation from civil society organizations and communities who are calling for the inclusion of key points, we ask, how can we address the causes of the environmental crisis, the biodiversity crisis, the human rights crisis, how can we go down to the roots of the cause with the economic and development and the model of democracy and participation that we have, but this is not being addressed in the negotiations.”

Garate also noted: “This is the first space in a COP where there is clear language about defenders and communities. But in this COP what they are really going to talk about is indicators, but there are main and secondary goals, and there are other indicators that include attacks against environmental defenders and this is a secondary indicator, where the countries only have to say yes or no, this is a voluntary report, this means in reality countries don’t have the obligation to report on how defenders are being threatened or attacked in their countries.”

He highlighted: “One of the points that we’ve had during the COP is to ensure that indicators exist on the situation of attacks against defenders, that this becomes a principal indicator, and it becomes an indicator that requires countries to do reporting on the attacks against defenders.”

Garate concluded: “We know that there are some countries in Latin America following the Escazu Agreement who are promoting language that is more favourable for human rights and defenders at this COP, but we know there are other countries that are blocking this language and it’s not included. We also know that oil companies have more access to those closed much more than we do and that they can influence the messaging and language that is used.”

Yannick Wild

Yannick Wild is the Advocacy Coordinator for PBI-Switzerland who regularly intervenes at the UN Human Rights Council in Geneva. Wild talked about the Binding Treaty on business and human rights.

He explained: “The idea of the Binding Treaty was launched in 2014 with a Human Rights Council resolution with the idea to establish an Open Ended Intergovernmental Working Group to establish a legally-binding instrument to regulate the activities of transnational corporations.”

Wild also noted: “The idea was really to go beyond the voluntary basis of the Guiding Principles on business and human rights and to create this binding piece of international law because as we know business are guided by profit maximization and it’s asking a lot for them to voluntary do something to reduce those profits and some companies are actively violating human rights so definitely voluntary measures are not enough.”

He commented: “There are actually only two mentions of human rights defenders in the actual draft right now.”

“There is one in the preamble that provides the recognition of human rights defenders in preventing and seeking remedies for human rights violations committed by companies and it also formulates the obligations of states to ensure the safety of human rights defenders. Just a preamble but it establishes already the recognition that States must give to human rights defenders and this obligation to their safety.”

And then the most important article that says: “Measures by States to prevent involvement of business enterprises in human rights abuse shall include legally enforceable requirements for businesses while carrying out human rights due diligence to protect the safety of human rights defenders, journalists, workers, members of Indigenous peoples, among others, as well as those who may be subject to retaliation.”

Wild shared the link to the latest draft here.

Wild added: “There is opposition by some States that are skeptical about the role of human rights defenders. On the other hand, there have been also pushes to include more language about human rights defenders especially by Palestine in the last sessions.”

He further noted: “One of the bigger movements for the Binding Treaty is one that we are also part of as Peace Brigades International. The link to that movement is here. This is a coalition of 250 organizations and social movements that are affected by the activities of transnational corporations, groups that resist land grabs, mining activities, environmental destruction that are caused by transnational corporations globally. They are calling for a stronger Binding Treaty and they have also drafted their own draft treaty, the Peoples’ Treaty, where they are mentioning human rights defenders. One is that human rights lawyers and human rights defenders are allowed to act in litigation processes against transnational corporations. And the second part would be for human rights defenders to be recognized to respond to accusations against them in order to avoid criminalization and persecution.”

Key dates

The COP16 biodiversity conference now underway in Cali concludes on November 1. Shortly afterwards, the COP29 climate conference will take place from November 11 to 22 in Azerbaijan. Following that, the next round of negotiations on the Binding Treaty on business and human rights will take place from December 16 to 20 in Geneva (postponed with little notice, as Wild noted, from October 21 to 25).

Next year, the anticipated COP30 climate conference will take place on November 10 to 21 in Belém, Brazil.

Just prior to COP28, Global Witness highlighted that at least 1,390 land and environmental defenders had been killed since COP21 in December 2015.

The key question remains: What can be done to stop the killings, threats against, and harassment, criminalization and judicialization of environmental defenders and uphold the land, water and territories they protect?

We continue to follow all these processes.

The Peace Brigades International-Canada team has one staffperson and eleven volunteer Board members who support the accompaniment of frontline defenders through articles, social media, webinars, advocacy tours, delegations and research. To enable this work to continue, please donate here.