International Law Association, American branch
International Law Weekend (ILW)
October 28-30, 2021.

Co-Founder & Executive Director Jojo Mehta will be speaking as part of a panel on Friday, October 29 at 2:00-3:15 pm EDT / 7-8.15pm BST / 8-9.15pm CEST

Prosecuting the Crime of "Ecocide" at the ICC and Elsewhere

This panel is co-sponsored by the ABILA International Criminal Court and International Environmental & Energy Law Committees

Climate change represents a contemporary crisis for humans all around the world. We no longer talk about its future impacts but rather its present ones. Despite this, international instruments and mechanisms have been ineffective in protecting the environment and combating climate change.

Proposals have been made to criminalize environmental destruction under international law to hold perpetrators accountable and to deter others.

Several States have called for the crime of ecocide to be added to the Rome Statute and an expert panel has been convened to draft the relevant provisions. Ecocide is already criminalized as a war crime when part of an armed conflict, and by some states in national legislation.

The panel will explore the history and development of the crime, its potential codification, and its ability to mitigate or prevent environmental destruction.

Moderators:
● Milena Sterio, Director, Domestic and International LL.M. Program, Charles R. Emrick Jr.-Calfee Halter & Griswold Professor of Law, Cleveland-Marshall College of Law
● Julie Fraser, Assistant Professor, Netherlands Institute of Human Rights (SIM) and the Montaigne Centre, Utrecht University

Panelists:
● Kate Mackintosh, Executive Director, Promise Institute for Human Rights, UCLA Law
● Tarini Mehta, Associate Professor, Assistant Dean of Student Affairs, and Director, Environmental Law and Science Advocacy, Forum Jindal School of Environment and Sustainability
● JoJo Mehta, Co-founder and Executive Director, Stop Ecocide International; Convenor, Independent Expert Panel for the Legal Definition of Ecocide
● Leila Sadat, James Carr Professor of International Criminal Law, Washington University