Brazilian President Jair Bolsonaro has been charged with crimes against humanity at the International Criminal Court (ICC) for his alleged role in the destruction of the Amazon.
Austrian environmental justice campaigners Allrise has filed a complaint against the Brazilian president at The Hague-based court on Tuesday morning. This is the first case of its kind in which deforestation is linked to the loss of life by environmental activists.
In Amazon, the Planet-warming greenhouse gas emissions from burning and industrial-scale agriculture are greater than the total annual emissions of Italy or Spain.
The speed-up Deforestation in the region already releases more CO2 than the rest of the Amazon can absorb.
The case demanded legal proceedings against Bolsonaro and his administration for their actions which directly impact the climate of the world negatively.
The complaint accused the Brazilian politician of waging a widespread campaign that resulted in the murder of environmental defenders and endangered the global population through emissions caused by deforestation.
It harnesses the growing field of climate attribution science, which allows researchers to prove a link between extreme weather events, on the one hand, and global heating and environmental degradation, on the other.
The team behind it said that Bolsonaro’s administration had sought to “systematically remove, neuter, and eviscerate laws, agencies, and individuals that serve to protect the Amazon”.
The complaint said that the Brazilian leader was responsible for approximately 4,000 square kilometers (400,000 hectares) of lost rainforest each year and that he had presided over monthly deforestation rates that had accelerated by up to 88 percent since taking office on January 1, 2019.
The team of experts estimated that emissions attributable to the Bolsonaro administration due to rampant deforestation will cause over 180,000 excess heat-related deaths globally this century.
