A/HRC/44/44 the territories of all too many small island developing States and, by extension, negatively affecting human rights, including their dignity and self-determination. 116 Therefore, they and other vulnerable developing countries invoke the need for international solidarity in redressing the climate-induced harms that they disproportionately experience. 117 48. This loss and damage agenda aims to rectify such global injustice and human suffering to the degree possible, given the destruction emanating from climate change. International finance, in particular, is a core means to achieve human rights-based international solidarity on this issue. The international climate regime’s institutional mechanism on loss and damage is examining some possibilities for extending financial support in this direction (FCCC/PA/CMA/2019/L.7). Moreover, a human rights claim in the Philippines may soon elucidate corporate duties to rectify loss and damage. 118 However, progress on this agenda has not adequately reflected its importance. Loss and damage is a “third pillar” of international law on climate change and should be granted the same level of priority as mitigation and adaption.119 After all, States gave it an independent provision in the Paris Agreement.120 The Independent Expert sees the unwillingness of some to develop this agenda in the most robust way, notably through extending strong financial support, as an acute gap in human rights-based international solidarity, demanding a substantive enhancement thereto. 2. Protecting indigenous peoples, local communities and workers against the negative consequences of mitigation actions 49. Ensuring access to justice for indigenous peoples and local communities affected by climate change mitigation projects is yet another key gap in human rights-based international solidarity. Not unlike international development projects, climate mitigation may involve infrastructure and land use projects that displace local communities and indigenous peoples, cause environmental damage and contravene rights to free, prior and informed consent. For example, significant human rights risks are understood to arise from hydroelectric dams and biofuel projects.121 The Clean Development Mechanism provided few avenues to object to such projects and no rights of appeal or to compensation. 122 For its part, the Paris Agreement acknowledges that parties should respect, promote and consider human rights, the rights of indigenous peoples, and local communities, among others, in taking actions to mitigate climate change. 123 However, States have continued to resist the inclusion of human rights safeguards in the rules they are negotiating for projects that will feed into carbon markets. 124 Setting aside other drawbacks of relying heavily on carbon markets, the absence of procedural and substantive rights for groups affected by mitigation measures clashes with the requirements of human rights-based international solidarity in this area. 50. On a different register, the international community has by now accepted that the systemic ramifications of moving to sustainable economies will require international solidarity to achieve a just transition that protects workers’ rights. In the present report, the Independent Expert has also drawn attention to the reverberating effects that economic 116 117 118 119 120 121 122 123 124 In this regard, see the International Law Commission’s ongoing project on sea-level rise in relation to international law (A/73/10, chap. X). See Elisa Calliari, Swenja Surminski and Jaroslav Mysiak, “The politics of (and behind) the UNFCCC’s Loss and Damage Mechanism”, in Mechler and others, Loss and Damage. See www.ciel.org/news/groundbreaking-inquiry-in-philippines-links-carbon-majors-to-human-rightsimpacts-of-climate-change-calls-for-greater-accountability. Julia Kreienkamp and Lisa Vanhala, “Climate change loss and damage: policy brief” (2017), pp. 2 and 7. Paris Agreement, art. 8. See the conference room paper by Tessa Khan, “Promoting rights-based climate finance for people and planet”. Available at www.ohchr.org/EN/Issues/Development/Pages/19thSession.aspx. See Sébastien Duyck, “The Paris Agreement and the protection of human rights in a changing climate”, Yearbook of International Environmental Law, vol. 26 (2017). Paris Agreement, eleventh preambular paragraph. International Institute for Sustainable Development, Earth Negotiations Bulletin, vol. 12, No. 775 (2019), p. 16. 17