Not long ago we did a short post on Norway's 'Global Warming Tours', where politicians, especially U.S. politicians, were being invited to c'mon down and sample the effects first-hand. I don't know if people are flocking to get on that bus or not, but one thing we do know is politicians are busy people, and with all the important things that have to get done in a day, concerns over little things like 'the end of the world as we know it' can tend to get sidelined.

The Inuit, however, are not going to wait for politicians to come to them - but will bring the arctic to the politicians instead.

A delegation of Inuit is to travel to Washington DC to provide first-hand testimony of how global warming is destroying their way of life and to accuse the Bush administration of undermining their human rights.

The delegation, representing Inuit peoples from the US, Canada, Russia and Greenland, will argue that the US's energy policies and its position as the world's biggest emitter of greenhouse gases is having a devastating effect on their communities. Melting sea ice, rising seas and the impact on the animals they rely on for food threatens their existence. - The Independent

The Inuit have been jumping legal hurdles for a while now. Not only is global warming moving twice as fast in the arctic than it is in other parts of the world, but the intimacy between the Inuit and their natural surroundings means any changes has a direct and dramatic effect on their ability to continue their traditional way of life. As such, the claim the Inuit are presenting is one of human rights violations through the actions (greenhouse gas emissions) and inactions (failure to work to curb those said emissions) of the U.S. government.

The invitation for the Inuit to give testimony before the ICHR next month comes just days after the most recent report of the Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change provided a dire assessment about the threat of climate change. In the Arctic, scientists have estimated that summer sea ice could completely disappear by 2040. - The Independent

After the IPCC report was released, the U.S. stance on global warming took a noticeable shift (see below movies!). In fact, Sam Bodman, the U.S. Energy Secretary made an official statement which read:

"As the President has said, and this [IPCC] report makes clear, human activity is contributing to changes in our earth's climate, and that issue is no longer up to debate." - YouTube

Up until now, the Inuit have been met with the defensive tactic of "maybe global warming is not man-made", but, according to the above, this argument can no longer be brought to the table. The contribution of human activity to climate change is "no longer up to debate.". I'm not a betting man, but I'm sure that sentence will be read aloud at the Inuit hearing.

Will these people of the north be met with a new and desperate rebuttal? Will the panel they'll put their case to - the InterAmerican Commission on Human Rights (ICHR) - acknowledge their case only to have it dismissed by higher U.S. courts?

"... The ICHR plays an important role in interpreting and defending human rights, and we are encouraged that it has decided to consider the question of global warming."

The ICHR, an arm of the Organisation of American States, can issue findings, recommendations and rulings... though the US has always made clear it does not consider itself bound by the court's rulings. - The Independent

Or, will the Inuit finally get the overdue acknowledgement that we can't just sit around and wait while their world literally melts away underneath their feet? After all, where's the justice here? We're the cause, but they suffer the effects. The old saying "you made the bed, you sleep in it" doesn't apply in this instance - since we made the bed....

Further Reading:

• here
• and here