Agora 2: International Environmental Law

Chaired by Professor Ellen Hey

Although the phenomena of climate change, deforestation, desertification and dwindling biodiversity preceded the collapse of the Iron Curtain, they have received unprecedented attention in the decades since. To what extent has international law kept pace with this increased concern? Has an awareness of the need for global cooperation on the environment resulted in strong international legal instruments? What are the weaknesses of international environmental law?

Non-compliance procedures in multilateral environmental agreements: weaknesses' diagnosis and therapy

MR ANTONIO CARDESA-SALZMANN, PhD Candidate, Universitat de Barcelona

Abstract: The paper focuses on the suitability of the Montreal Protocol’s Non-Compliance Procedure (NCP) as a model of ad hoc compliance control mechanism for global MEAs. It elucidates and distinguishes the conditions under which NCPs have proved most effective from those under which they show flaws. Furthermore, it forwards proposals to overcome their weaknesses, and to enhance their functionality.


Specifically, it demonstrates that the Montreal Protocol’s NCP provides a model of endogenous enforcement mechanism for environmental regimes primarily based on direct regulation measures. In these cases, where Parties undertake obligations erga omnes partes protecting communitarian interests, NCPs actually work and strengthen the regime.


In regimes that protect the environment and human health by regulating international movements of certain products, the Parties’ commitments set up a bundle of bilateral obligations. In this context, triggering-conditions of NCPs are similar to those of standing in adjudicative dispute settlement (DSP). Hence, compliance issues are handled bilaterally or referred to well-established DSP, e.g. the WTO’s. Here NCPs are not functioning properly. Improving their functionality in these regimes, would rely on vesting the Secretariat with wider triggering-powers.


Overall, NCP’s functionality could be improved if accreditation conditions of NGOs and their interaction with the MEA’s institutional arrangements along the procedure were refined. They would then better assist non-compliant Parties, making DSP avoidable. Yet, even if Parties were to recur to DSP, particularly the WTO’s, a simultaneous NCP could be supplementary, enhancing mutual supportiveness between the trade and environment regimes and furthering the (sectoral) constitutionalization of International (Environmental) Law.

Biography: Antonio Cardesa-Salzmann has a Degree in Law (Universitat de Barcelona, 2000). He made post-graduate studies in Nice (IEHEI, 2001) and an internship in DG Environment at the European Commission (2002). Back at the UB, he continued his studies and will defend his doctoral thesis on Compliance Control in Global MEAs in May 2010. From 2005 to 2010 he has been an Assistant Professor of International Law at the UB. He has been a visiting researcher at the Max-Planck-Institute for Comparative Public Law and International Law (2008). He has publications in the field of International Environmental Law and International Labour Law.

Cardesa-Salzmann - Draft ESIL Paper

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Prosecuting environmental damage under international criminal law

MR MATTHEW GILLETT, Appeals Counsel, Office of the Prosecutor, International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY)

Abstract: With environmental issues such as climate change, deforestation, loss of biological diversity and pollution emerging as global threats over the last two decades, and with diplomatic efforts such as the 2009 Copenhagen Climate Summit failing to produce convincing solutions, it is critical to explore alternative means of preventing and punishing serious damage to the environment. One possible mechanism is international criminal law, which has experienced a remarkable resurgence over the last twenty years. International tribunals have been created and have adjudicated cases and international criminal law has been codified and jurisprudentially developed. However, despite this activity, prosecutions at the international level of those responsible for severe environmental destruction have not eventuated.

Certain commentators suggest that too much emphasis is placed on prosecuting individuals responsible for grave destruction of the environment under provisions directly prohibiting such damage, otherwise known as ecocentric provisions. These commentators suggest that it would be more productive to prosecute environmental damage indirectly under well-established prohibitions against harm to human beings and their interests, otherwise known as anthropocentric provisions. In order to explore the validity of this claim, this report sets out a performance appraisal and analysis of the prosecution of serious environmental damage under international law. It is designed to stimulate those working in the field of international environmental law to look to international criminal law as a means of protecting the natural environment. At the same time, it is hoped to generate suggestions for the further incorporation of environmental law principles into international criminal law.

Biography: Currently an Appeals Counsel at the ICTY, Matthew Gillett has previously worked in Chambers at the ICTY and in the Immediate Office of the Prosecutor of the ICC. He has taught and published in the field of international criminal law and provided pro bono legal advice to the climate change documentary The Age of Stupid.

Gillett - Draft ESIL Paper

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La convention d'Århus: "avancée majeure du droit international" ?

MS CHRISTINE LARSSEN, Doctorante en droit international de l'environnement, Centre de Droit International, Université Libre de Bruxelles

Résumé: La convention d’Århus, née dans le contexte de « démocratisation » et de « verdisation » (greening) de la région paneuropéenne suite à la chute du mur de Berlin, organise un système participatif dans lequel trois droits procéduraux en matière d’environnement – le droit d’accès à l’information ; le droit de participation au processus décisionnel ; le droit d’accès à la justice –, donc trois droits de l’Homme de la 1ère génération, permettraient au public de contribuer à garantir un droit de l’Homme de la 3ème génération : le droit de chacun, dans les générations présentes et futures, de vivre dans un environnement propre à assurer sa santé et son bien-être.


Nous examinerons si le système participatif de la convention d’Århus – qui est en voie de s’étendre aux quatre coins de la planète – constitue véritablement une « avancée majeure du droit international », comme le déclarent les représentants réunis à la première Réunion des Parties à la convention. Nous arguerons qu’il convient de veiller à ce que le droit à l’environnement (ou d’autres droits de la 3ème génération) ne se réduise(nt) à un simple faisceau de droits de l’Homme de la 1ère génération ; à ce que l’exercice du système participatif ne soit réservé à une élite. Partant, nous insisterons sur l’importance d’inclure les droits de l’Homme de la 2ème génération dans le système participatif, explorerons les virtualités de la convention d’Århus à ce propos, afin que son système participatif soit réellement une « avancée majeure du droit international » .

Biographie: Christine Larssen élabore une thèse de doctorat sur la convention d’Århus au sein du Centre de Droit International de l’Université libre de Bruxelles (ULB). Elle est actuellement (jusque fin septembre 2010) Visiting Fellow au Lauterpacht Centre for International Law, Cambridge University. Elle a effectué ses études de droit à l’ULB, où elle obtint, en 1999, le diplôme de licenciée en droit (magna cum laude, Prix Ganshof van der Meersch). Se spécialisant en droit de l’environnement depuis 1995, Christine Larssen a publié une série d’analyses dans le domaine, et tout particulièrement des analyses relatives à – ou pertinentes pour – la convention d’Århus.

Larssen - Draft ESIL Paper

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