The top United Nations court has ruled that nations are obligated under international law to limit climate change, and countries that don’t act could be held legally responsible for climate damages elsewhere. The decision is a win for many small countries vulnerable to climate impacts, which pushed for the issue to be heard by the International Court of Justice (ICJ). It’s the court’s first major ruling on climate change, but the decision is only advisory, meaning that countries are not legally bound by it. Still, legal experts say it could be a boost for other climate change lawsuits pending in national courts around the world. “It’s really groundbreaking,” says Maria Antonia Tigre, director of Global Climate Change Litigation at Columbia Law School. “I think it will create this new wave of climate litigation.”

Additional coverage in the National Observer, by John Woodside: Landmark court ruling a stark rebuke of Canadian position on climate change. David Boyd, an associate professor with the University of British Columbia and former UN Special Rapporteur on human rights and the environment, told Canada’s National Observer those findings “should send shivers down the spine” of the fossil fuel industry and governments that support it.