Research On The Prevention And Control Of International Environmental Crime

With the global environmental crisis worsening, the international environmentalcrime is also increasingly rampant. In recent decades, the continuous growth of theinternational environmental crime has been damaging the global environmentalresources to an even larger extent. Meanwhile, it has also further infringed upon theoverall environment rights and interests for mankind. Therefore, environmental issueshave become a global concern in the21st century, so the punishment and preventionof International environmental crime have become the hot spots and cutting-edgeissues in the research field of international crime. Therefore, the national legislativefocus has been shifted on strengthening of environmental legislation, and punishingand preventing the crimes in the damage to environmental resources by means ofcriminal law. The author believes that in term of the international environmental crime,the prevention is more important than punishing in legislation and to which moreattention should be paid. This paper covers this issue in the following five sections:The first part is about the definition, the scope and the hazards of internationalenvironmental crime, and the significance of the study of crime prevention in order todevelop a clear way in its research. So far, the international community has not yet gotthe common view on the concept of environmental crime, and scholars ofinternational criminal law and relevant international organizations have only probed itfrom different sides. Thus, it’s the top priority nowadays to research and improve thedefinition of international environmental crimes and make it unific and authoritativein international documents. The author agrees to the definition of internationalenvironmental crime made by O’Neill, a Brazil expert of international criminal law, in its “International Criminal Code and the International Criminal Tribunal for thedraft”, and takes it as a starting point to discuss the concept of internationalenvironmental crime and problems of prevention and focuses mainly on the twoaspects: environmental pollution and destruction to natural resources in internationalenvironmental crime. The author believes that the international environmental crimeshould be defined as follows: those who are the perpetrators, whose behaviour hasimplemented or destroyed natural resources causing two or more countries to bepolluted environmentally and to be damaged ecologically and the consequences areserious, in violation of a State obligations under international law that should be andthe relevant national environmental rights, should bear criminal acts.The second part is about the Legislative Review on the prevention ofinternational environmental crime. From the standpoint of international law, as theworld has been generally aware that the environmental pollution has the realistichazards and potential crises to human existence, environmental crime not onlydamages the country’s ecosystems, affects other countries and even endangers thesafety of the ecological environment of the entire planet as well. Thus, more attentionthan ever before should be given to prevention and punishment in the worldwideinternational environmental crime, and through signing international treaties and therelevant legal documents to curb international environmental crime from happening.At the same time, the United Nations, the International Criminal Law Association, theCouncil of Europe and other international organizations have been makingunremitting efforts in the areas of crime prevention in the international environment.This, in a large part, pushes the international community to punish internationalenvironmental crime. At present, there is no mandatory international legislation in theInternational Convention on the regulation of international environmental crime,which is the greatest weakness to effectively preventing international environmental The third part of this paper examines the specific practice situations in theinternational environmental crime prevention. In recent years, new trends in theinternational environment crime have come into being, one of which is illegal tradein ozone-depleting substances. Its latest manifestation is illegally tradinghydrochlorofluorocarbons. Such a kind of act will intensify internationalenvironmental crime, and objectively make increasingly complex the prominenthazards in international environmental crime. At the same time, this new trend alsopresents new challenges in the international environmental crime prevention. With thegradual politicization and economization of international environmental issues, eachcountry has gradually shifted the diplomatic focus on the environmental diplomacy.States have generally strengthened the management functions to global environmentalissues, expanded the staffing in environmental management agencies, and graduallyincreased the capital budget in the environmental agencies. As environmental issueshave reached far around the world, it is necessary to punish such cross-border crimesand crimes against human interests, so we must strengthen the extensivecommunication, coordination and collaboration in the international community.Therefore, in recent years, members of the international community, one after anotherthrough setting their domestic environmental legislation or signing treaties, havestrengthened regional and global collaboration, resisting environmental crime.The fourth part is about the countermeasure choices in internationalenvironmental crime. The author believes that the international environmental crimeprevention should follow the principle of comprehensive management to protect theenvironment and the principles of ecologicalization to maintain the ecological balancefrom the two aspects; preventive social measures and legal measures. In terms ofsocial measures of the international environmental crime prevention, the mechanismsfor the Global Environment Fund should be established, setting up a permanentcoordinating body for environmental protection, carrying out the management projects for regional environmental protection, establishing a reporting system ofenvironmental information to the public, strengthening the collaboration among therelevant law enforcement agencies and strengthening environmental taxations. Interms of legal response to the guard against international environmental crime, theinternational cooperation mechanisms should be further improved, to deepeninter-regional cooperation continuously, to strengthen law enforcement efforts to theinternational environmental crime prevention, to develop new rules to control theillegal trade, and to strengthen the implementation and supervision over the“multilateral environmental agreements”. Meanwhile, the international organizationas a supranational institution should play an active, coordinating role to enablecountries to maintain communication in action.The fifth part is about the analysis, in contrast to international environmentalcrime prevention legislation, of the deficiency existing in China’s legislation for itsenvironmental crime prevention efforts, offering a sound proposal. In the “CriminalLaw Amendment (two)” promulgated in2000the provisions for environmentalcrimes, compared with the previous version, has been improved, as to the2002’s“People’s Republic of Amendment (four)”, the provisions of environmental crimeshave also been strengthened, describing the crimes in damage to the environment inthe relevant sections about the “crime of endangering public safety”. February25,2011through the “Criminal Law Amendment (eight)”, respectively, of “illegalmining crimes”(Article343, paragraph1) as well as “major environmentalpollution accident crime”(Penal Code Section338) were amendments. Theamendments on environmental crime, reflecting the modest reduction of crimeconstitutes a standard and that strict criminal, and strengthen the environmental crimeeffectively combat the idea. Not only moderately expand the scope of environmentalcrime types, reduce pollution environmental crime incriminate threshold, but alsoenhances the operability, in large part to ensure the punishment of environmental crime efforts. Thus, China’s legislation on environmental crime in the criminalprovisions already made great strides forward, which also reflects our country topunish environmental crimes through the use of criminal means, thereby protectingenvironmental resources determination. These provisions in the criminal law topenalize environmental crimes, in large part, ensure the efforts in punishingenvironmental crimes, and to some extent, expand the scope relevant to theenvironmental crime. As China is a developing country, the criminal legislation onenvironmental development in our country is still weak in the basis, and late in start,but there are still a lot of to be perfected. In addition, there exist environmentaldamages in reality, and the awkward relationship between the economic developmentand environmental prevention poses a challenge for us. Therefore, aiming at relativelynarrow scope for environmental crimes in legislation in guard against theenvironmental crime, the relative simpleness in setting the types for environmentalcrimes, the simplification in the legislative forms, and non-standard settings in systeminvolving environmental crimes, we should expand the scope covering environmentalcrimes, set types of hierarchical environmental crimes, emphasizing the diversity oflegislation, and establish a scientific and rational legislative system.