Prosecutor General: Ukraine first in history to investigate environmental crimes as war crimes

16:58, 20.10.2023 1 min read

Ukraine is the first country in the history to investigate crimes committed by the occupation forces against the natural environment as war crimes, Prosecutor General of Ukraine Andriy Kostin has said.

"We are the first [country] in the history of mankind to investigate crimes against the natural environment as war crimes. We cooperate with all our partners," he said at a Friday press conference during a break in the international conference "United for Justice. United for Nature" in Kyiv.

"Being the first, we have no right to make a mistake," Kostin said.

He also noted that the Ukrainian prosecutors started to qualify the environmental crimes committed by the occupation forces exactly as war crimes one year ago.

"When we started to focus on the crimes against the natural environment, we realized that this is also a crime against Ukraine as a state, and this is a crime against our future as long as by destroying our environment the enemy is trying to destroy a normal future life of Ukraine and Ukrainians," the prosecutor general said.