Smog-hit China is set to pass a new law that would give Beijing more powers to shut polluting factories and punish officials, and even place protected regions off-limits to industrial development, academics with knowledge of the situation said.
Long-awaited amendments to China’s 1989 Environmental Protection Law are expected to be finalized later this year, giving the Ministry of Environmental Protection (MEP) greater authority to take on polluters.
While some details of the fourth draft are still under discussion, it has been agreed that the principle of prioritizing the environment above the economy will be enshrined in law, according to academics who have been involved in the process. The fourth draft is due to be completed within weeks.
“[Upholding] environmental protection as the fundamental principle is a huge change, and emphasizes that the environment is a priority,” said Cao Mingde (曹明德), a law professor at the China University of Political Science and Law, who was involved in the drafting process.
The first change to legislation in 25 years will give legal backing to Beijing’s newly declared war on pollution and formalize a pledge made last year to abandon a decades-old growth-at-all-costs economic model that has spoiled much of China’s water, skies and soil.
The ministry has called for the law to spell out how new powers can be implemented in practice, but the National Development and Reform Commission, the country’s economic planning agency, prefers broader, more flexible principles.
Local authorities’ dependence on the taxes and employment provided by polluting industries is reflected by the priorities set out in China’s growth-focused legal code, said Wang Canfa (王燦發), an environment law professor who runs the Center for Pollution Victims in China and also took part in the drafting stage.
In the absence of legally enshrined powers, the ministry has often made do with one-off national inspection campaigns to name and shame offenders, as well as ad hoc arrangements with local courts and police authorities to make sure punishments are imposed and repeat offenders shut down. It has also stretched existing laws to its advantage.
Last year, it began to use its powers of approval over environmental impact assessments, which are mandatory for all new industrial projects, to force powerful industrial firms such as Sinopec and the China National Petroleum Corp to cut emissions at some of their plants, threatening to veto all new approvals until the firms met their targets.
The new law would give the ministry the legal authority to take stronger punitive action.
It will also set up a more comprehensive range of punishments, putting an end to a maximum fine system that allowed enterprises to continue polluting once they had paid a one-off fee normally much lower than the cost of compliance.
Cao said the final draft was also likely to impose an “ecological red line” that will declare certain protected regions off-limits to polluting industry, though detailed definitions are likely to come later.
The legislation also proposes to formalize a system by which local cadres are assessed according to their record on pollution issues, including meeting emissions targets.
For nearly two years, academics, ministries, local governments, companies and officials have been debating the changes to the environmental protection law.
One of the most fiercely contested parts of the new draft was a clause designed to prevent most environmental NGOs from filing lawsuits against polluters.
The first draft said lawsuits could only be filed via the government-affiliated All-China Environmental Federation, though subsequent changes allowed other government-registered organizations that have been operating for at least five years to launch legal action.
‘TERRORIST ATTACK’: The convoy of Brigadier General Hamdi Shukri resulted in the ‘martyrdom of five of our armed forces,’ the Presidential Leadership Council said A blast targeting the convoy of a Saudi Arabian-backed armed group killed five in Yemen’s southern city of Aden and injured the commander of the government-allied unit, officials said on Wednesday. “The treacherous terrorist attack targeting the convoy of Brigadier General Hamdi Shukri, commander of the Second Giants Brigade, resulted in the martyrdom of five of our armed forces heroes and the injury of three others,” Yemen’s Saudi Arabia-backed Presidential Leadership Council said in a statement published by Yemeni news agency Saba. A security source told reporters that a car bomb on the side of the road in the Ja’awla area in
‘SHOCK TACTIC’: The dismissal of Yang mirrors past cases such as Jang Song-thaek, Kim’s uncle, who was executed after being accused of plotting to overthrow his nephew North Korean leader Kim Jong-un has fired his vice premier, compared him to a goat and railed against “incompetent” officials, state media reported yesterday, in a rare and very public broadside against apparatchiks at the opening of a critical factory. Vice Premier Yang Sung-ho was sacked “on the spot,” the state-run Korean Central News Agency said, in a speech in which Kim attacked “irresponsible, rude and incompetent leading officials.” “Please, comrade vice premier, resign by yourself when you can do it on your own before it is too late,” Kim reportedly said. “He is ineligible for an important duty. Put simply, it was
SCAM CLAMPDOWN: About 130 South Korean scam suspects have been sent home since October last year, and 60 more are still waiting for repatriation Dozens of South Koreans allegedly involved in online scams in Cambodia were yesterday returned to South Korea to face investigations in what was the largest group repatriation of Korean criminal suspects from abroad. The 73 South Korean suspects allegedly scammed fellow Koreans out of 48.6 billion won (US$33 million), South Korea said. Upon arrival in South Korea’s Incheon International Airport aboard a chartered plane, the suspects — 65 men and eight women — were sent to police stations. Local TV footage showed the suspects, in handcuffs and wearing masks, being escorted by police officers and boarding buses. They were among about 260 South
Syrian President Ahmed al-Sharaa on Sunday announced a deal with the chief of Kurdish-led forces that includes a ceasefire, after government troops advanced across Kurdish-held areas of the country’s north and east. Syrian Kurdish leader Mazloum Abdi said he had agreed to the deal to avoid a broader war. He made the decision after deadly clashes in the Syrian city of Raqa on Sunday between Kurdish-led forces and local fighters loyal to Damascus, and fighting this month between the Kurds and government forces. The agreement would also see the Kurdish administration and forces integrate into the state after months of stalled negotiations on
RSS