Speaking at a meeting organised Thursday by the non-governmental group International Court of the Environment Foundation (ICEF) argued that such a court would supplement existing national and international legal systems, and would complement the International Court of Justice at the Hague and the ICC being discussed in Rome.

"Chernobyl and other environmental disasters have shown that pollution does not respect national borders, so defence of the earth cannot just be left to individual states," said Kenneth McCallion, a lawyer who worked to obtain 5 billion US dollars in damages (pending appeal) for plaintiffs in the Exxon-Valdes case, which stemmed from the 11 million gallons of oil spilled in the Prince William Sound, Alaska. He was also lead attorney in the Shoreham nuclear power plant case, which resulted in 400 million dollar rebate for taxpayers.

There are inadequate legal avenues to seek redress for environmental disasters that cross boundaries, activists argue. "Although some protocols exist dealing with specific issues, no comprehensive environmental treaty exists, and an international treaty would fill in the gaps," said McCallion.

Speakers said they were encouraged by the fact that the ICC drafters do recognise the impact of human rights violations on the environment, since the text mentions the environment in an optional clause of the war crimes section.

ICEF director and Italian supreme court judge Amadeo Postiglione said there had been an escalation of environmental degradation since Chernobyl, which made the creation of an international judicial forum for the resolution of environmental cases "not a utopia but an absolute necessity".

"We need an interdisciplinary, technically integrated autonomous international court for the environment, not composed solely of jurists, like the Hague court. The creation of such a court will represent progress: degradation of the environment will be recognised as crime against humanity by the international community," he said.

"In such a court, everyone become a prosecutor. It will back up governments while respecting the principle of state sovereignty," he stressed. More than 50 countries had expressed their support for the planned court, Postiglione said. "Solutions above and beyond the capacities of individual governments need to be found," Giovanni Cordini of the University of Pavia said, adding that the key issue was the application of legislation in a supranational context.

McCallion said that access to the proposed environment court must be opened up to NGOs, individuals and groups, unlike the International Court of Justice at the Hague, whose jurisdiction was generally limited to disputes between states and which in its 50 years of existence had considered very few environmental cases.

The Rio de Janeiro Earth Summit in 1992 declared that all people should have effective access to judicial and administrative proceedings, including redress and remedy, he recalled. "We need to protect the global 'commons' - clean air and water should be defended together with the fundamental human rights," he said. "All the world's goods belong to all the world's peoples and do not just have a material cost. Every individual needs to assume spiritual responsibility for them," said Padre Bernardo, adding the Vatican was in favour of a charter for the environment.

In April 1999, ICEF is holding a conference on environmental justice and the creation of an international court for the environment to be held at and jointly organised with George Washington University in the US. Alison Dickens