An Introduction of Kelly Matheson
Speaking of experts, we’d like to take a moment here to introduce you to Kelly Matheson. Kelly joined our team this year as our Deputy Director of Global Climate Litigation. She first connected with OCT over a decade ago, just months after our founding in 2010, through her work with WITNESS, an international human rights organization that uses film and technology to document violations of human rights around the world. OCT and WITNESS undertook a three-year partnership to create a series of award-winning films to share the stories and elevate the voices of OCT’s youth plaintiffs. Once this partnership, led by Kelly, came to a close, she then stepped onto our Board of Directors, serving as a member of our board for many years, before joining our staff team in the day-to-day work of youth-led climate litigation.
Kelly leads our global litigation and legal advocacy efforts from Amsterdam, collaborating closely with our team across the United States and colleagues and partners throughout the world.
|
|
|
|
Kelly and her pups!
|
|
An Undertaking of Global Proportion
So what’s next for our global program? In addition to developing new global cases on behalf of youth around the world, our efforts in 2023 will strive to brief global courts and leaders on “climate rights as human rights” and the urgent need to protect our children and future generations. And with Kelly at the helm, we will accelerate our campaign in many nations to ensure that courts have access to evidence of the best available science - including accurate scientific metrics for measuring our progress on addressing the climate crisis - as judges hear climate cases in jurisdictions around the globe.
We will also continue to submit critically important briefs like the ones we submitted last week with partners Oxfam and the Centre for Child Law to the European Court of Human Rights, as well as seek opportunities to intervene in additional cases and provide amicus support. We will amplify and expand our work to brief judges, attorneys, decision-makers, legal scholars, partners, reporters, and the public on the best available science and why we must protect the rights of our children to a safe climate now, using methods like short animations, legal scholarship, and joining and leading global coalitions. And we will continue to explore and pursue new pathways to secure climate justice for our planet’s children in their nations' courts.
Thank You
The climate crisis is global. Our work to protect children’s climate rights is global. And our community of support is global too. Thank you to each and every one of you, wherever you are may be on our shared celestial home. Together, we are mighty and, together, we will win.
Toward global climate justice in 2023,
The Team at Our Children’s Trust
|
|
|
|
