Legal Protection for Climate Change Refugees

The increased industrial activities during the past decades have resulted in fundamental changes in the climatic patterns. In the most vulnerable places, these climate changes could lead to disasters such as sea level rise, increased frequency of extreme weather, and drought and water scarcity. One of the most important consequences of these events on human's lives is the creation of new flows of forced migration. It is predicted that over the course of this century, more than two hundred million people will be displaced as a direct result of climate change. Protection of a new group of asylum seekers, which is almost twenty times bigger than what the refugee instruments currently protect, is one of the emerging concerns of the international legal studies. This article aims to illustrate the incapability of the current refugee protection system in providing sufficient protection for climate change-induced displaced persons through the analysis of the leading international and regional legal documents relating to the refugee's rights and protection, as well as evaluating the specific requirements of this group of refugees. Despite the significant attempts towards protecting the climate change refugees in regional level, there is still a serious need for a novel mechanism both in regional and international domains in order for the authorities to deal with this issue.