The EU has agreed to enshrine in law a new offence that aims to punish the most serious crimes against the environment. The final text emerged following several months of negotiation (“trilogues”) between the European Council, Commission and Parliament considering, inter alia, the establishment of a “qualified offence” aimed at preventing and punishing the gravest environmental harms including, as the accompanying recitals specify, “cases comparable to ecocide”. Read More →

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“Ecocide” means unlawful or wanton acts committed with knowledge that there is a substantial likelihood of severe and either widespread or long-term damage to the environment being caused by those acts.

– Independent Expert Panel for the Legal Definition of Ecocide, June 2021