So Ecocide IS a threat to the Security of Mankind

The UK government finally recognises that environmental damage (in the form of climate change) is a threat to our security. It follows that it must now recognise Ecocide as a crime against peace and the security of mankind.

In the 1990’s a proposed international crime of Ecocide was mysteriously dropped from the draft Rome Statute for the International Criminal Court. It transpires that this was probably due to the objections of three powerful countries – the UK, US and Netherlands.

This is what the UK government said at the time;

…there is certainly no general recognition of "widespread, long-term and severe damage to the natural environment" as being an international crime, much less a crime against the peace and security of mankind. Environmental damage may give rise to civil and criminal liability under municipal law but it would be extending international law too far to characterize such damage as a crime against the peace and security of mankind. (Documents of the forty-fifth session. Yearbook of the International Law Commission 1993 Volume II Part One. Page 102, para 31)

Well how things have changed. The UK government has finally (and belatedly) accepted that climate change (a form of environmental damage) is a threat to our security (Climate change is a threat to our security, BBC).

In a year in which Boris Johnson has a huge platform (from the Security Council to the chairmanship of G7 in June, culminating in the vital Glasgow climate summit in November) he must use it to announce the UK’s support for an International Law of Ecocide - the missing 5th Crime Against Peace.

I urge anyone reading this to join the Stop Ecocide International campaign and take action.