03 April 2024
The Silent Victim of Israel’s War on Gaza
In March 2024, Forensic Architecture reported that more than 2,000 agricultural sites, including farms and greenhouses, have been destroyed in Gaza since October 2023. Almost six months into Israel’s war on Gaza, evidence indicates the devastating impacts of the war on the natural environment in Gaza. In particular, it has been reported that farms have been devastated, and nearly half of the trees in Gaza were razed. While this raises numerous issues, the question of whether Israel’s large-scale airstrikes on Gaza would make a substantial contribution to serious violations of international humanitarian law (IHL) protecting the natural environment during armed conflicts, deserves more thought than it gets. Continue reading >>
1 
09 March 2024
Ecocide à la Bruxelloise
Belgium's new ecocide provision has been hailed as a resounding victory for environmental activists, particularly so for the burgeoning Stop Ecocide campaign. But is the widespread excitement justified? Can the new law deliver on the lofty expectations? And how does it fit within the soon-to-be adopted revision of the Environmental Crime Directive at the EU level? Despite constituting a highly symbolic step, I argue that the Belgian law’s constrained scope makes it a toothless tool to punish environmental outlaws in practice. Continue reading >>03 July 2023
The Kakhovka Dam and Ecocide
The destruction of the Kakhovka dam and consequent damage to housing and flooding of tens of thousands of hectares of land, is reportedly causing severe harm to humans and nature. This blogpost argues, first, that the destruction of the Kakhovka Dam potentially violated prohibitions under multiple fields of international law, but that challenges will nonetheless arise in establishing criminal responsibility for those violations due to the distinct elements of the relevant criminal provisions and the heightened burden of proof on the prosecution in such cases. Because various normative systems are applicable to the facts, ranging from international humanitarian law, international criminal law, and international environmental law, a means of reconciling conflicts of norms will be required. This will be best served by an approach of complementary interpretation. Continue reading >>
0