Up in Smoke? Victim Status in Environmental Litigation before the ECtHR

Whereas the ripples of Verein KlimaSeniorinnen proceed to unfold within the educational world, with discussions about potential implications for the long run jurisprudence of the ECtHR, on January 30, 2025, the Courtroom handed down one other landmark judgment within the area of environmental litigation. The case of Cannavacciuolo and Others v. Italy addressed the systematic and large-scale air pollution phenomenon brought on by the mismanagement of hazardous waste in components of the Campania area within the South of Italy. The judgment is ground-breaking for locating a violation of the precise to life (Article 2 ECHR) for the primary time in reference to environmental air pollution (additional features of the case have been mentioned on the weblog right here).

Moreover, this was the primary main environment-related judgment for the reason that adoption of the KlimaSeniorinnen judgment final April, which allowed the Courtroom to make clear whether or not its modern strategy to the locus standi could possibly be utilized to environmental circumstances not associated to local weather change. Nevertheless, the judgment confirmed that such an strategy might not prolong to different environmental circumstances, even when it considerations widespread and large-scale air pollution that’s intrinsically linked with the triple planetary disaster of local weather change, air pollution and biodiversity loss. This contribution critically displays on the Courtroom’s stance on locus standi within the Cannavacciuolo judgment and its implications for the way forward for environmental litigation earlier than the ECtHR.

Case Background and Judgment

The case – beforehand known as Di Caprio and Others v. Italy – revolved across the so-called “Terra dei Fuochi” (“Land of Fires”) phenomenon on the territory between the province of Naples and the south-western space of the province of Caserta. The air pollution stems from the unlawful dumping, burying and/or uncontrolled abandonment of hazardous, particular and concrete waste, typically carried out by legal organised teams in an space with a inhabitants of almost 2,900,000 inhabitants. Scientific research have recognized a causal hyperlink between the rise and excessive fee of most cancers mortality – significantly in lung, pleura, larynx, bladder, liver and mind cancers – and the air pollution ensuing from inappropriate waste administration and the existence of unlawful garbage dumps [para. 18]. The long-standing poisonous air pollution additionally prompted quite a few proceedings on the home and EU degree, together with Fee v. Italy (C-297/08), establishing the State’s failure to undertake the mandatory measures to make sure waste assortment with out endangering human well being and harming the atmosphere and Fee v. Italy (C-653/13) saying failure to adjust to the prior judgment [paras. 167–173].

The appliance of the Cannavacciuolo case was introduced by people and 5 associations (non-governmental organisations, NGOs) alleging the violation of their proper to life (Article 2) and respect for personal and household life (Article 8) ensuing from the large-scale air pollution within the space. The Courtroom fastidiously examined the sufferer standing of all of the candidates [listed in Annex I]. It declared solely seven particular person candidates’ claims admissible, hanging out the NGOs’ and different people’ claims who haven’t resided within the municipalities recognized in an inter-ministerial decree or who’ve did not adjust to the six-month time-limit [paras. 222, 249, and 296].

Relating to the deserves of the grievance, the Courtroom first assessed the alleged violation of the precise to life. It concluded that such unlawful and unregulated dumping of hazardous waste within the current case could possibly be thought to be harmful actions which pose a danger to human life. Moreover, the Courtroom famous that the seriousness of the potential hurt to human well being affecting environmental components, corresponding to soil, water, and air, is undisputed among the many events [para. 385]. Recognizing air pollution from poisonous waste dumping as a harmful exercise represents an modern improvement within the Courtroom’s jurisprudence. For the primary time, the ECtHR deemed such air pollution to satisfy the brink of the precise to life, which requires a “actual and imminent” danger to human life. Beforehand, the Courtroom had primarily addressed environmental hazards below the precise to personal and household life, emphasising their impression on well-being fairly than their direct menace to life, as seen in Di Sarno and Others v. Italy. Moreover, the Courtroom embraced a systemic strategy to environmental safety and human rights and thought of latest developments within the case regulation of different jurisprudences, together with the UN Human Rights Committee (Portillo Cáceres v. Paraguay, mentioned right here) and the Inter-American Courtroom of Human Rights (Advisory Opinion OC-17/23 and La Oroya Inhabitants v. Peru, mentioned right here and right here). These developments verify the rising significance of building the obligation to guard in gentle of the ideas of prevention and precaution [paras. 179–185].

Having discovered a violation of Article 2, the Courtroom didn’t contemplate it mandatory to look at the grievance below Article 8. Subsequently, the judgment undeniably strengthens the arguments of Decide Serghides in regards to the emergence of a sub-right to a wholesome, clear and sustainable atmosphere first pronounced within the concurring opinion in Pavlov and Others v. Russia and Kotov and Others v. Russia below Article 8. The event of such a sub-right is especially related within the European human rights system, because it stands as the one regional human rights framework that doesn’t explicitly recognise environmental rights. Thus, the judgment might present one other impetus for adopting a long-discussed extra protocol on the precise to a wholesome atmosphere, because it highlights persistent and widespread environmental points throughout the European continent that proceed to threaten public well being and human rights.

The severity and systematic nature of the air pollution within the “Terra dei Fuochi” space prompted the Courtroom to undertake a pilot-judgment process and urge the State to implement a complete technique of measures to decontaminate the realm, together with establishing a monitoring mechanism and an data platform throughout the time restrict of two years. The appliance of the pilot-judgment process within the current case constitutes a ground-breaking improvement within the Courtroom’s jurisprudence, as it’s the first time the ECtHR has used this strategy to deal with a structural downside of environmental safety.

Breaking Floor in Substance, Standing Nonetheless on Process

Whereas the judgment already represents a milestone within the ECtHR’s environmental jurisprudence for the explanations briefly mentioned above, it arguably displays a step backwards or at the least a standstill when it comes to standing, significantly in gentle of KlimaSeniorinnen. Particularly, one of the vital modern features of the latter judgment was actually the Courtroom’s versatile stance on the standing of associations within the context of local weather change litigation. The Courtroom granted standing to the applicant NGO representing its members (people) who, in flip, didn’t meet the sufferer standing standards of Article 34 ECHR. Consequently, the Courtroom discovered a violation of the precise to personal and household life (Article 8) and the precise to a good trial (Article 6).

This conclusion launched a totally new strategy to the standing of NGOs within the ECtHR’s environmental jurisprudence and consequently raised quite a few questions as to the prohibition of actio popularis and was additionally topic to robust criticism, remarkably by Decide Eicke within the partly concurring, partly dissenting opinion on the judgment. Nonetheless, the Courtroom then justified the standing of the applicant NGO by “particular concerns regarding local weather change” [KlimaSeniorinnen, para. 498]. Nevertheless, on the time of the adoption of the judgment, this conclusion essentially raised the query of whether or not such an strategy would impression the long run improvement of the Courtroom’s jurisprudence regarding widespread environmental degradation, corresponding to air pollution and biodiversity loss.

Our query was answered before anticipated within the latest Cannavacciuolo judgment: the locus standi standards set out in KlimaSeniorinnen might not apply to different environmental, non-climate associated claims, such because the “Terra dei Fuochi” phenomenon. The Courtroom identified that its strategy to standing in KlimaSeniorinnen had been distinctive and justified by “the particular characteristic of local weather change as a typical concern of humankind and the need of selling intergenerational burden-sharing on this context” [KlimaSeniorinnen, paras. 498–499 cited in Cannavacciuolo, paras. 220–222]. This may occasionally suggest that the Courtroom goals to differentiate between local weather change and different types of environmental hurt, easing the locus standi standards for the previous whereas upholding its strict strategy for the latter [as argued in the concurring opinion of Judge Krenc, para. 4 and in the partly concurring, partly dissenting opinion of Judge Serghides, para. 2]. Nevertheless, the Courtroom didn’t assess the substantial distinction between local weather change and large-scale environmental air pollution that may reassuringly justify its divergent strategy within the two judgments. The excessive threshold for particular person candidates that the Courtroom upheld in Cannavacciuolo is properly illustrated in Cordella and Others v. Italy, the place the Courtroom excluded 19 out of the 180 candidates from the scope of victims, as they didn’t stay within the cities categorised as being at excessive environmental danger. In distinction, the Courtroom thought of the proximity of the candidates’ houses to the sources of air pollution as one of many elements to be thought of and granted standing to all candidates within the abovementioned Pavlov case. Subsequently, even in gentle of the Courtroom’s earlier environmental circumstances, the Courtroom’s strategy appears comparatively strict and arguably inconsistent.

Nevertheless, local weather change shouldn’t be the one extreme disaster the planet faces in the intervening time; it’s one ingredient of the triple planetary disaster, together with air pollution and biodiversity loss, which has been addressed within the Reykjavík Declaration (2023). Thus, because the concurring opinions of each Decide Krenc and Decide Serghides highlighted, systematic, decade-long, widespread and large-scale air pollution, corresponding to that within the “Terra dei Fuochi” space, is also thought to be a part of the worldwide disaster. The judgment, subsequently, raises a number of questions: What “particular characteristic” of local weather change justifies distinguishing it from different environmental crises additionally affecting hundreds of thousands of individuals? Moreover, why are the standards for standing seemingly extra lenient in local weather change circumstances, the place people presently don’t meet the brink for sufferer standing, in contrast to large-scale environmental air pollution circumstances with clearly identifiable victims?

In gentle of the above, it could possibly be concluded that the Cannavacciuolo judgment represents a milestone within the improvement of the ECtHR’s environmental jurisprudence, primarily for locating the violation of the precise to life and making use of the pilot judgment process, each for the primary time. Nevertheless, it could additionally spark additional debates when contrasted with the Courtroom’s strategy to different planetary crises, corresponding to local weather change.