A landmark opinion from the United Nations International Court of Justice has ruled that rising sea levels caused by climate change do not require countries to redraw their maritime borders. Small island nations, among the most vulnerable to sea level rise, are hailing the decision as a victory against a threat to their sovereignty. In a July 23 advisory opinion, the U.N.’s highest court concluded that a nation’s existing maritime zones should remain unchanged even if coastlines shrink as sea levels rise. It also said that if the landmass of an established country were to be completely submerged by rising seas, “the disappearance of one of its constituent elements would not necessarily entail loss of statehood.” In Mongabay’s Sept. 9 podcast, host Mike Digirolamo spoke to Angelique Pouponneau, an environmental lawyer from Seychelles and lead negotiator for the Alliance of Small Island States. “What island nations were trying to guard against through state practice was essentially if there were ever to be loss of territory, it would not mean loss of exclusive economic zone,” Pouponneau said in the interview. Countries can claim control over ocean waters up to 200 nautical miles (370 kilometers) from their shores, an area known as the exclusive economic zone (EEZ), where they hold exclusive rights to fishing and natural resources. Until relatively recently, shorelines were presumed to be stable. The 1982 United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea that first established legal limits for claims on the ocean makes no mention of sea…This article was originally published on Mongabay

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