Dudorov O., Kamensky D. The European Union directive on the protection of the environment through criminal law: an overview of selected novels

DOI: https://doi.org/10.33098/2078-6670.2025.19.31.311-326

Objective. The purpose of this article is to highlight the main criminal law novelties introduced by Directive 2024/1203 of the European Parliament and of the Council on the protection of the environment through criminal law, replacing Directives 2008/99/EC and 2009/123/EC (Directive), and to determine the prospects for implementing this document into the criminal law of Ukraine. The methodology includes a comprehensive analysis and elaboration of the provisions of the said international legal document, the current criminal law of Ukraine, scientific sources, and the formulation of the author’s conclusions. The following methods of scientific cognition were used in the study: logical and semantic, formal and logical, systemic and structural, comparative and legal, and modeling. Results. Based on the results of the study, it has been established that: 1) by enshrining the idea of effective, proportionate and dissuasive sanctions for violation of environmental legislation, which (sanctions) are subject to unification in all EU Member States, the Directive embodies a progressive model of criminal law environmental protection in the European space. However, the experience of implementation of the previous “environmental and criminal” Directive (2008), as well as the history of discussion and adoption of the current Directive, demonstrate the problems faced by Member States on the way to Europeanization of their criminal law; 2) by adopting the Directive, the European legislator partially changed the approaches to filling in the blanket nature of the relevant criminal prohibitions: instead of a voluminous annex of European regulations that served as a regulatory basis for the application of criminal legal measures under the previous Directive, the flexible directive wording “clearly violates the relevant requirements of substantive law” creates the basis for the introduction of the concept of “autonomous environmental crime”, the implementation of which will mean that criminal liability for environmental encroachment in certain situations will no longer depend on violation of administrative provisions, regulatory requirements and requirements of permits, licenses and quotas; 3) the content of the Directive serves as an additional argument in favor of: a) the traditional approach to consolidation of the relevant criminal law prohibitions implemented in Ukraine. Scientific novelty. The authors analyze certain criminal law provisions of the Directive and expresses the authors’ views on their implementation in national criminal law. Practical significance. The results of the study can be used in lawmaking activities with the goal to improve the current Criminal Code of Ukraine and the draft of the new Criminal Code of Ukraine.

Key words: criminal offenses against the environment, European criminal law, European Union, criminalization, implementation, blanket, principle of subsidiarity, pollution, torts of endangerment.

References

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