It continues: “ Commission of Small Island States on Climate Change and International Law members hope that a strong opinion from the tribunal will prompt governments to take tougher action on climate change. The prime minister of Antigua and Barbuda, Gaston Browne, told the tribunal that it was time to speak of “legally binding obligations, rather than empty promises that go unfulfilled, abandoning peoples to suffering and destruction”, Climate Home News reports. For the tribunal, this will be a test case: The Oceans Court, as it is also called, has ruled on issues like fisheries, rights of passage, and seabed mining and pollution, but it has never heard a case on greenhouse gases and their impact on climate change and the oceans.” It adds that the two-week session of the court in Germany has “drawn wide attention”, with representatives of more than 50 counties asking to participate orally or through writing. But the convention, negotiated in the 1970s, does not mention emissions of greenhouse gases and their effects on the warming and acidification of the oceans, and on sea-level rise. The convention has been ratified by 168 nations, though not by the US. The newspaper continues: “Arguments will revolve around the 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, the legal framework that covers uses of the oceans and their resources, including the obligation to protect the marine environment. Yesterday, a group of nine Pacific and Caribbean island nations appeared before an international court, asking it to rule that excessive greenhouse gases are pollutants that violate international law, the New York Times reports. And Axios adds: “The storm comes as the Mediterranean has been hammered by multiple natural disasters that are linked to human-caused climate change, including Greece’s devastating wildfire season and multiple record-breaking heat waves.” The Associated Press, the Financial Times and the Daily Telegraph also carry the story.
Sky News says that foreign governments offered support on Monday. “Authorities in the east declared Derna a disaster zone on Monday after floodwaters burst through its two ageing dams, inundating wide swaths of the city and leaving muddy, churning river in their wake,” the Washington Post says. Reuters could not immediately verify either figure.” The Guardian says: “The precise number dead is hard to gauge with communications down and administration hampered by a decade-long battle for power between two rival governments each backed by their own militias.” BBC News reports that authorities have declared a state of emergency and imposed a curfew, ordering schools and shops to close. It adds: “Earlier on Monday, the head of the Red Crescent aid group in the region had said Derna’s death toll was at 150 and expected to hit 250. According to the newswire, Ahmed Mismari, the spokesperson for the Libyan National Army that controls eastern Libya, estimates that 5,000-6,000 people are missing.
Authorities in eastern Libya say at least 2,000 people have been killed and thousands more are missing after “a massive flood ripped through the city of Derna following a heavy storm and rain”, Reuters reports.
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