A British government official from the environment department has told the UN that the UK government can never accept that nature or Mother Earth has rights.
The dismissal of a concept that has already been recognised in UN declarations and is a fundamental belief of many Indigenous communities was described by critics as shameful, contradictory and undemocratic.
According to reports, Britain’s rejection of rights for nature came during a debate in preliminary negotiations for the UN environment assembly in Nairobi on Wednesday, when government representatives were asked to consider a draft resolution by Bolivia on “living well in balance and harmony with Mother Earth and Mother Earth centric actions.” This included a passage on the rights of nature.
The US, the EU, Canada and the UK are reported to have spoken against the resolution, saying they had not been given sufficient time to consider a complex issue that Bolivia had submitted at the last moment.
The British delegate from the Department for Environment, Food, and Rural Affairs (Defra) said that the draft resolution failed to respect diversity of opinions about how to perceive and interact with nature. He added that he opposed the core principle of the resolution and appeared to rule out any possibility that the UK would ever be able to accept this different way of treating nature in courts of law.
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“The UK’s firm position is that rights can only be held by legal entities with a legal personality. We do not accept that rights can be applied to nature or Mother Earth,” the delegate said. “While we recognise that others do, it is a fundamental principle for the UK and one from which we cannot deviate.”
Legal experts have been working on the rights of nature, which aims to strengthen protections for species and ecosystems that have been devastated by the prevailing market view of them as resources to be slaughtered or harvested.
A multiplicity of campaigns around the world have made progress in this area, which is often also associated with efforts to unify Indigenous knowledge, ethical thinking and environmental protection.
The Center for Democratic and Environmental Rights has collated a list of the countries, regions and legal systems that have recognised rights for nature. Ecuador, Bolivia, Uganda, the US, Canada, Brazil, New Zealand, Mexico and Northern Ireland have some recognition of the rights of nature in their constitutions, national laws or local regulations.
Story was adapted from the Guardian.
