Legal Protection of Environment in Conditions of War: Theoretical and Practical Analysis

The paper investigates the issues of international legal regulation of environmental protection and ensuring environmental security during armed conflict. It is substantiated that environmental protection during armed conflict should be based not only on the application to the environment of the rules for the protection of civilian objects but also on the recognition of the need to ensure special protection of the environment as such. An important point of the research is the search for a legal mechanism for the proper provision of compensation for damage caused to the environment, the calculation of the amount of damage and an effective procedure for such compensation. The article outlines the main problems, results, and prospects of the newest legal mechanism being formed in Ukraine to ensure compensation for the damage caused to the environment by Russia’s military actions. In this article, attention is paid to the following key issues: types and features of the activities of subjects (state authorities and civil society organisations) in ensuring compensation for damage to the environment; problems of collecting, analysing, recording, and verifying evidence of damage caused; regulatory mechanisms for determining the amount of compensation for damage; problems of achieving real compensation for damage. The study also defines the prospects of Ukraine’s post-war environmental policy from the perspective of ensuring environmental security. For this purpose, the provisions of the Law of Ukraine “On Environmental Protection” were analysed on the matter of guaranteeing environmental security in wartime. It is concluded that the post-war restoration of the Ukrainian environment should be multifunctional because, in addition to eliminating the consequences of military actions, it should also meet the new standards of the European community.