Ecocide on the Nordic political agenda thanks to youth movements

Thanks to the work and pressure of Nordic and Baltic youth movements, the Secretary General of the Nordic Council of Ministers, Paula Lehtomäki, has agreed to discuss the criminalisation of ecocide at the Nordic level. “We will put the issue of ecocide on the agenda, and together discuss what we can do within this sphere” said Lehtomäki at a roundtable discussion prior to the international UN conference, Stockholm Plus 50.

The youth organisations have worked together over six months and drafted 60 recommendations, in the hope that their policy paper would be integrated in the official outcome of the UN meeting. The term ‘ecocide’ is used several times in the paper, as they urge governments to “introduce large-scale environmental destruction, ecocide, as a crime in the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court - as a means to hold governments and corporations accountable for their damage to our common planet”.

Emma Kari, Minister of Environment and Climate of Finland, with Maija Kuivalainen, Youth Climate Delegate of Finland and Björn Fondén, at the Stockholm+50 conference.

Other major demands include the need to increase climate finance, to phase out of fossil fuels, and to fund a just green transition. “The most important outcome is that ecocide crimes will be discussed at the Nordic level. It was also positive that the ministers acknowledge that they don’t know everything, and that they’re prepared to listen to us.” said Björn Fondén, member of the Stockholm+50 Youth Task Force in an article on the Nordic Council’s website. 

The policy paper was presented on June 1st, at a roundtable with Nordic ministers for the environment and climate: Annika Strandhäll from Sweden, Lea Wermelin from Denmark, Espen Barth Eide from Norway, Emma Kari from Finland, Alfons Röblom from Åland, and the Secretary General of Nordic Council of Ministers Paula Lehtomäki. 

The Nordic Youth have already expressed their support for an international crime of ecocide in their position paper on biodiversity, published in 2021. Among the regulations needed to ensure that private actors protect nature, they list the importance to “criminalize large-scale environmental destruction by including ecocide in the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court.”