For the first time, the UN Committee on the Rights of the Child explicitly affirmed children's right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment and published a detailed analysis of member states' obligations under the United Nations Convention on the Rights of the Child.

This convention, created in 1989 and ratified by 196 states, sets out the universal rights of children, such as the right to life, survival and development and the right to health. The General Comment provides legal guidance on what these rights mean for a particular subject or area of law. General note no. 26 on children's rights and the environment, especially on climate change, which has just been published, explicitly addresses the climate emergency, the collapse of biodiversity and pervasive pollution, while proposing countermeasures to protect the lives and life prospects of children.