Inside the Dismissed Russian Climate Case and the Fight for Siberia's Future

A person walks at the Batagaika crater, created by permafrost thaws, in Russia's Sakha Republic in July 2023. Until relatively recently, the Yukaghir people lived on the bleak, frozen tundra of northeast Siberia in the same way they had done for centuries, surviving on fishing, hunting, gathering and reindeer herding. Today, there are only 1,813 of them remaining, according to the latest census, after conquest, disease outbreaks and assimilation by Russian settlers as well as industrialisation during the Soviet era. Now, what is left of their traditional lifestyle is threatened by the changing climate.

“Any fisherman knows when the best fishing is in his area, what time, where the fish are and when they bite best. This is knowledge of the natural rhythms associated with a particular spot,” Yukaghir elder Vyacheslav Shadrin told Al Jazeera. “Indigenous peoples also possess such knowledge, … and based on this, we developed our survival strategy. … ‘Tomorrow, we’ll be here. Then we’ll move on to some other place’ and so on. And this allowed us to exploit these natural resources effectively and in the most environmentally friendly and ecological manner.”

But these weather cycles are no longer predictable, Shadrin said. “Most elders say that nature is playing tricks or deceiving us. They try to explain why this is happening – because we’ve committed too many violations.” Temperatures in Russia – the fourth-largest emitter of greenhouse gases after China, the United States and India – are rising at more than twice the global average. This has led to mounting environmental consequences not only on the Siberian tundra but also for the entire planet.

As a result, a group of activists filed a lawsuit against the Russian government four years ago, first through the Russian Supreme Court, then the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR). Known as the Russian Climate Case, it argued that the Russian government has been irresponsible and failed to meet its international climate obligations. But in June, an ECHR judge ruled the case inadmissible. “No reasoning was provided,” said Arshak Makichyan, one of the plaintiffs. “Our legal team obviously disagrees, especially since there were similar cases that the court considered and ruled on, so this outcome was quite unexpected for us.”

Makichyan noted the consequences risked by many of the plaintiffs. Along with other members of his family, Makichyan was stripped of his Russian citizenship in 2022, which he believes was retaliation for his activism. “We can only speculate about the reasons. Personally, I think it was a political decision. … I believe the court was reluctant to deal with Russia on such a serious issue.”

In Siberia and Russia’s Far North and Far East, the climate crisis is an everyday reality. “Floods occurred once every three to four years, catastrophic floods once every 10 years,” Shadrin said. “And now, a year without floods is becoming something of an anomaly, [and] forest fires happen every year.” Wildfires burn millions of hectares of Russian forests each year. Russia’s worst wildfire season since records began was in 2021 when nearly 190,000sq km (73,400sq miles) – larger than the area of Syria or Uruguay – were incinerated.

Although the situation has improved recently thanks to weather conditions and enhanced fire protections – only 10,000sq km (8,860sq miles) have burned so far this year – fires can occur nearly year-round, including within the Arctic Circle and during the winter, which had normally been spared. Another issue is melting permafrost, which lies beneath more than half of Russia’s surface. Permafrost stores vast amounts of greenhouse gases and organic matter over millennia. When it thaws, this all gets released as the ground opens up, accelerating climate change and causing immediate complications.

Officially, Russia remains committed to the Paris Agreement, which it formally joined in 2019, pledging to reduce greenhouse gas emissions with the goal of carbon neutrality by 2060. However, critics argue little government funding has been allocated to these programmes, with policy shaped primarily to serve the interests of the fossil fuel industry.

Despite setbacks with the ECHR, plaintiffs in the Russian Climate Case are planning to continue their efforts via other avenues, including appealing to the ECHR’s president and the United Nations human rights framework.