On Wednesday this week, history was written on both sides of the Atlantic. In Brussels, the European Parliament unanimously proposed including “ecocide” into EU law while in New York, a consensus UN resolution called for a legal Advisory Opinion on the obligations of states with respect to climate change.
The direction of travel is clear. We invite YOU to claim your place in this legacy work.
4 years ago, virtually nobody had heard the term “ecocide” (mass damage to nature), let alone making it a crime. Now, thanks to Stop Ecocide International’s diplomatic and legal convening and highly effective global cross-sector collaborations, criminalising ecocide is being discussed in dozens of governments around the world*.
Why? Because criminalising ecocide will protect vital ecosystems, create accountability at the highest levels of government and industry, underpin and reinforce existing environmental laws, and create a positive steer for investors, insurers and boards of directors.
Meanwhile, a small Pacific island nation (Great Ocean state) - the Republic of Vanuatu - has made history, by leading a global coalition of 133 co-sponsoring countries to the first ever adoption by consensus of a UN resolution. Their groundbreaking request calls for clarification of the obligations of states towards vulnerable countries and future generations with respect to climate change under existing laws and agreements.
On Monday 2nd December 2019 in The Hague, at the International Criminal Court (ICC)'s annual Assembly of States Parties, the Pacific island state of Vanuatu made a bold statement - that the Assembly should seriously consider expanding the court's remit to include a crime of ecocide.
Vanuatu is now ready to work in close partnership with Stop Ecocide International to bring that powerful diplomatic advocacy to bear on the next logical step: establishing the preventive criminal law parameters - “ecocide law” - which will make it so much easier for states to fulfil those obligations and adhere to multilateral environmental agreements**.
The direction of travel is clear: from clarifying existing obligations to deterring and preventing future harms. The time is right to take this to the global level and make ecocide a crime at the International Criminal Court.
*Also being discussed by the International Criminal Court, the UN, EU, Council of Europe, the Inter Parliamentary Union, the Vatican, the World Council of Churches, Parliament of World Religions, Club of Rome, International Corporate Governance Network, UN Climate Champions, Business For Nature, the BTeam, Nature Finance, and international youth movements… the list goes on.
In 2022 Be The Earth joined forces with Stop Ecocide, Gower Street, Savitri Trust, The Roddick Foundation and Bertha Foundation to experiment on a funders collaboration that could guarantee a part of core costs for Stop Ecocide International to continue doing this vital piece of international advocacy - and at the same time explore the role of funders in choosing collaboration as a strategy to unlock change.
This funding group is an ongoing experiment and seeks to diminish bureaucracy and create a relationship and trust-based structure more fantastic than the sum of its parts. It's now time that we invite more funders into the mix, amplifying the reach of Stop Ecocide International in partnership with the Republic of Vanuatu to implement international law and the mindset shift across important policy and cultural influencers on the importance of protecting our mother and our home!
We must stop mass damage to our world, in language, culture and law!
If you are a funder and want to know more about this group, please contact anne@betheearth.foundation