The three Pacific Island countries of Vanuatu, Fiji and Samoa have made a joint submission to the International Criminal Court (ICC), proposing a change in the rules of the court, to recognise ecocide as a crime alongside genocide and war crimes. The submission defined the crime of ecocide as “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”.
The ICC formed in 2002, deals with the crimes of genocide, war crimes and crimes against humanity. Following the legislation included in the Rome Statute. In order for the crime of ecocide to be recognised and tried in practice an amendment to the Rome Statute would have to be completed as seen in 2010 when an amendment to the Rome Statute expanded the scope of the ICC to include crimes of aggression, such as the use of armed forces by one state against another.
In the case the submission is successful, it would change the current law and allow for the prosecution of individuals who are responsible for causing large scale environmental damage including Heads of States and heads of large companies. This change is likely to have a global effect as the ICC has more than 120 participating countries, however this does not include countries such as US, China, India and Russia who are all major emitters of greenhouse gases.
This comes alongside global changes in the laws surrounding the environment, as Belgium has recently adopted ecocide as a crime, aiming to prevent and punish the most severe cases of environmental degradation, such as extensive oil spills. Punishments for violations can include up to 20 years imprisonment and up to 1.6 million euro fines for corporations. The EU has recently recognised ecocide as a qualified offence and Mexico has recently submitted a bill to introduce ecocide as a crime nationally. Other countries such as Vietnam, Ukraine and Russia have already criminalised ecocide.