Instrumenti ekološke pravde
Instruments Of Environmental Justice

Summary/Abstract: Environmental justice has been developing as a movement and concept putting emphasis on the redefinition of the essential parts of environmental legislation and judicial protection of civil rights in cases related to environmental protection. Environmental and social justice entails efficient approach to the administrative and legal system whose purpose is to protect rights and implement legislation in the domain of environment and health protection. The Aarhus Convention is fundamentally related to international human rights and fundamental constitutional rights and freedoms. Access to justice, as defined in the Aarhus Convention, is based on the essential human right - that to a fair trial. This connection may be noticed in the link between the Aarhus Convention and other international documents dealing with the protection of human rights, such as the Universal Declaration of Human Rights (1948), International Pact on Civil and Political Rights (1966) and particularly European Convention on Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (1950). Standards of criminal law penalize behavior which stands in opposition to environmental provisions. Environmental standards of criminal law introduce criminal penalties so as to suppress illegal activities of legal entities in the domain of environmental law. According to the Recommendation of the European Parliament and Council of Europe, inspection in the environmental domain should be carried out by introducing a minimum of criteria into the organization and conduction of inspection, its procedures (decisions, charges, etc.) and into reporting on the activities of the inspection. The primary role of the environmental lawsuit is to act preventively against activities harming the environment. The environmental lawsuit may prevent the commencement of activities that could harm the environment before such harm occurs. In contrast to comparative law, our current judicial practice does not acknowledge intangible damages for the psychological pain caused by the harmful effect of industrial and adjacent industrial buildings, even though the right to a healthy environment is one of fundamental constitutional rights, paid as such due attention in Europe. According to the European Commission’s Serbia 2010 Progress Report (4.2.3 Environment): “Overall, Serbia is moderately advanced in the area of environmental protection towards fulfilling the European standards. The capacity to implement and enforce legislation remains to be strengthened.”

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