In Ukraine, before the establishment of environmental prosecutors, 6 thousand reports of violations of environmental legislation were submitted to the URPTI annually. In recent years, their number has increased to 8-9 thousand, Deputy Prosecutor General Viktoriia Litvinova said during a briefing, UNN reports .
Prior to the establishment of environmental prosecutors, 6,000 reports of violations of environmental legislation were entered into the Unified Register of Pre-trial Investigations annually. In recent years, their number has increased to 8-9 thousand
According to her, since 2021, there has been a steady upward trend in the number of indictments sent to court.
Before the creation of environmental prosecutors, for example, in 2020, the number of indictments sent to court was 1.4 thousand, while last year it was one third higher - 1.9 thousand. Most of them were in the field of flora protection (853, which is 12% more than in 2022), fauna (429, which is + 15% more than in 2022), and subsoil (200, which is 3% more than in 2022)
She noted that for the most part, these are not insignificant facts.
In some cases, we are talking about multimillion-dollar environmental damage that lasted for years, and it was the introduced specialization that allowed us to quickly and efficiently complete the pre-trial investigation and send criminal proceedings to court
Litvinova noted that the amount of established losses has almost quadrupled, from UAH 600 million to UAH 2.36 billion.
Already this year, more than 700 criminal proceedings have been brought to court, and the established amount of damages exceeded UAH 8.7 billion, which is almost 15 times more than in the whole of 2020. The upward trend is also observed in terms of verdicts, with more than 1,100 verdicts handed down by courts in 2023. This is 37% more than before the establishment of environmental prosecutors (811 in 2020)
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The decision to introduce environmental specialization of prosecutors was made in March 2021. On April 23, a Specialized Environmental Prosecutor's Office was established in the Prosecutor General's Office . And in September, the same prosecutor's offices were launched in the regional prosecutor's offices.