Crime of Ecocide; Past, Present and Future

The idea of criminalizing ecocide as an international crime, for the first time, was raised in the 1970s. However, this green idea did not become an international criminal norm because of the opposition of some powerful governments, the resistance of large business enterprises, and preponderance of economic development discourse over environmental law discourse. At the time of drafting statute of the international criminal court (1998), "war ecocide" was criminalized only as one of the manifestations of war crimes, even that was accompanied with so many conditions and limitations that it has almost been impossible to effectively prosecute and try ecocide perpetrators. This resulted in the impunity of ecocide perpetrators all around the world and in the continuation of the gradual destruction of the earth and its vital resources. In order to put an end to this environmental impunity, it is imperative that the international community criminalize ecocide crime (in peacetime) as the most severe and most serious environmental crime and put this crime within the jurisdiction of the International Criminal Court.