Geneva (Human Rights Council) 8 September 2026 (SPS) – British expert Dr. Nick Brooks stressed that the occupation of Western Sahara amplifies the climate change risks faced by the Sahrawi people, arguing that, in this sense, the occupation is a climate justice issue.
He made the remarks on Tuesday during a Side-Event entitled “Climate Justice and Human Rights in the Context of Foreign Occupation,” held on the sidelines of the 63rd session of the UN Human Rights Council at the Council’s headquarters in Geneva, under the auspices of the Geneva Group for Western Sahara.
Brooks explained that understanding climate risks is based on the framework developed by the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), which considers risk to arise from the interaction of four components: hazard, exposure, vulnerability and response.
He stressed that, in his analysis, the Moroccan occupation of Western Sahara exacerbates all of these components or drivers of the risks faced by the Sahrawi people.
Regarding exposure to extreme heat, he explained that the occupation has amplified such exposure by displacing the majority of the Sahrawi people from the coastal areas of the Occupied Territories to refugee camps in the desert interior. This has moved refugees from areas where the risk of extreme heat was relatively moderate to areas where that risk is severe.
He noted that the projected increase in the number of days exceeding 40°C is much greater in the interior of the Sahara, including the areas around the refugee camps, than in coastal areas.
He added that the camps are also located on the edge of a zone at extreme risk from the combination of high heat and high humidity. He explained that wet-bulb temperature measures the lowest temperature that can be achieved through evaporative cooling, and that as it approaches human body temperature, sweating becomes ineffective and heatstroke develops rapidly.
He stated that a wet-bulb temperature of around 34°C is widely viewed as the limit of human survivability, and that the Sahrawi refugee camps lie on the edge of a zone where wet-bulb temperatures are projected to exceed this threshold under 2°C of global warming, a level that is likely to be reached before 2050. By contrast, projected wet-bulb temperatures are much lower nearer the coast, areas to which, he said, Sahrawi refugees would have access were it not for the Moroccan occupation.
Addressing vulnerability to multiple hazards, Brooks noted that the conflict has increased the vulnerability of the Sahrawi people in multiple ways. He explained that poor infrastructure and limited access to resources in the refugee camps increase vulnerability to hazards such as floods and constrain the ability of Sahrawis to anticipate and respond to climate-related disasters.
In the Occupied Territories, the British expert said that marginalization and limited access to economic opportunities constrain the ability of Sahrawis living under occupation to respond and adapt to climate threats, while unsustainable use of natural resources and intensive development place pressure on fragile ecosystems and make them more vulnerable to climate change.
Brooks also examined the impact of the occupation on traditional knowledge and livelihoods, noting that the traditional practice of mobile pastoralism is no longer possible because of its prohibition in the Occupied Territories and restrictions on movement across Western Sahara resulting from the construction of the Berm and the renewed armed conflict.
He said this has resulted in traditional knowledge relating to the environment and its management no longer being passed on to subsequent generations, stressing that this cultural heritage is an invaluable climate asset in responding to climate change.
He noted that the UN General Assembly has defined cultural heritage as a “climate asset.” He added that the construction of the Berm has also blocked drainage channels, caused localized desertification and increased ecological vulnerability to drought.
Turning to climate responses, Brooks said that the way the international community has responded to climate change has itself contributed to increasing the vulnerability and risks faced by the Sahrawi people by constraining their ability to respond to the climate crisis.
He explained that global climate governance and finance are dominated by the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change and various international climate agreements, including the Paris Agreement. He noted that, because the Sahrawi Republic is not a UN member state, it cannot ratify the Convention or sign the Paris Agreement and therefore cannot participate in international climate negotiations.
He also pointed to the inability of the Sahrawi Republic to establish a Designated National Authority to receive official climate finance from major climate funds, saying that Morocco has received around a quarter of a billion US dollars in official climate finance, while the Sahrawi Republic has received none.
Concluding his intervention, Brooks argued that excluding the Sahrawis from global climate governance and finance mechanisms deprives them of financial support that he described as vital for adapting to climate impacts that threaten their existence.
noted that Morocco has submitted three Nationally Determined Contributions (NDCs) to the UN Framework Convention on Climate Change, containing emissions-reduction targets that depend, to an unknown but likely significant extent, on renewable energy development in the Occupied Territories of Western Sahara.
He concluded that the acceptance of these NDCs by the Convention means, in his assessment, that the Convention system is “endorsing and colluding” with the occupation. By contrast, the Sahrawi Republic has prepared an NDC but cannot submit it to the Convention because of its status as a non-UN member state.
On this basis, he noted that the International Court of Justice recognizes that climate change affects the enjoyment of a range of rights protected under human rights law. He argued that the occupation’s amplification of exposure, vulnerability and risk severely exacerbates this impact, particularly because the displacement of Sahrawi refugees exposes their right to life to the risk of temperatures that may become unsurvivable in the near future.
He concluded by raising the question of how existing and developing human rights laws can be deployed to address this injustice.
It should be recalled that this Side-Event was attended by a number of experts and political and human rights figures. Ambassador Geraldo Gonçalves Miguel Saranga, Permanent Representative of Mozambique and current Chair of the Geneva Group for Western Sahara, delivered the opening remarks, while Ambassador Ubbi Bouchraia Bachir, Special Adviser to the President of the Sahrawi Republic and Head of the Working Group on Natural Resources and Related Legal Matters, delivered the closing remarks.
The participants also heard interventions from Miguel Urbán Crespo, a former Spanish Member of the European Parliament (2015–2024) and political activist known for his engagement with human rights, international justice and the Western Sahara issue; British Dr. Nick Brooks, a specialist in human-environment interactions and climate change adaptation; and Eric Hagen, a Norwegian board member of the Western Sahara Resource Watch (WSRW), who has followed the involvement of foreign companies in the exploitation of Western Sahara’s resources since 2002 and also serves as Director of the Norwegian Support Committee for Western Sahara.
Dr. Andrea Maria Pelliconi, Lecturer in Human Rights Law at the University of Southampton and a researcher on demographic engineering, forced displacement, settler colonialism, apartheid and genocide in international law, also took part in the seminar. The event was moderated by South African environmental and human rights activist Catherine Constantinides. (SPS)
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