European court ruling puts cautious Swiss in climate bind
GENEVA/ZURICH — Switzerland for all its snowcapped mountains and crisp Alpine air has failed to protect its people from the ravages of climate change, as a top European court ruled this week.
Behind the picture postcard exterior, critics say, is a country that has done too little for the planet and acted as a business hub for some of the most powerful international corporations in fossil fuels and mining.
Political analysts and academics also say entrenched conservatism and a political system governed by popular referendums will complicate reform even after Tuesday’s ruling by the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg.
It found in favour of over 2,000 Swiss women — a third of them over 75 — who said their country’s inaction in the face of rising temperatures puts them at risk of dying during heatwaves.
The ruling cannot be appealed and the Swiss Federal Office of Justice, which represented the government before the court, said it must be implemented. It said it would analyse the ruling to determine the measures the country needed to take.
Immediately after the court decision, the Swiss Green Party called for climate targets for specific industries, including the finanical sector.
“People may have slightly beautiful dreams about Switzerland,” Lisa Mazzone, the party leader, said.
“Switzerland is the country of commodity trading, Switzerland is the country with a strong financial sector with a lot of investment in fossil fuels,” she added.
Swiss-based commodity trading companies handle 40% of all oil trades and 60% of the metal trading business, according to data published by industry association Suissenégoce.
The group of Swiss women known as Klimaseniorinnen did not make Swiss trading central to their case, although their Greenpeace-backed campaign that lasted many years called for tougher regulation to curb transactions fueling global warming.
REFERENDUMS
A 2022 international study into environmental sustainability ranked Switzerland in the top 10, but government efforts to implement stricter climate goals have so far been limited by the country’s regular referendums.
Leading Swiss newspapers took a sceptical view of the ruling in editorials that said it could undermine democracy.
The largest party, the rightwing Swiss People’s Party, said Switzerland should withdraw from the Council of Europe, which seeks to promote human rights in Europe and beyond, calling the court’s judges “puppets for activists”.