The 2024 Annual General Meeting of the China Council for International Cooperation on Environment and Development (CCICED) took place in Beijing from Oct 10 to 11 under the theme of "Open, Inclusive and Innovative Cooperation to Build a Clean and Beautiful World", consisting of three plenary sessions and seven thematic forums.
Zhang Xueqiao, Deputy Prosecutor General of the Supreme People's Procuratorate (SPP), attended and addressed the forum themed on "Technology Support and Rule of Law for Enhancing Co-control of Carbon Emission, Pollution Reduction and Green Growth" held on Oct 11.
Xu Xiangchun, Director General of the SPP's Public Interest Litigation Procuratorial Department, delivered a keynote speech, focusing on the effects of China's practices of procuratorial public interest litigation in protecting the ecological environment and resources.
Over the past decade, the judicial practice of China's procuratorial public interest litigation system has established a framework where civil and administrative public interest litigation coexist, with the latter primarily done by procuratorial organs. More than 90 percent of public interest issues are efficiently resolved in the pre-trial stage.
From January 2019 to June 2024, procuratorial organs nationwide handled over 450,000 cases of public interest litigation in the field of ecological environment and resources protection, effectively contributing to the resolution of a large number of prominent ecological environmental issues, and demonstrating a unique institutional value and playing an important role in China's ecological conservation.
In addition, the SPP attaches great importance to deepening international cooperation and maintains good cooperative relationships with organizations such as the CCICED and ClientEarth. It has also presented typical cases at the United Nations Climate Change Conference for multiple times, focusing on the outcomes of procuratorial public interest litigation in promoting China's fulfillment of international conventions such as the Ramsar Convention on Wetlands, the Convention on Biological Diversity, and the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change.
In his speech, Zhang presented major cross-jurisdictional public interest litigation cases in the country's major river basins, such as environmental pollution in the Nansi Lake, which is the largest freshwater lake in northern China, ship pollution control in the Yangtze River Basin, and water environment governance in the Pearl River Basin, all handled by the SPP.
Practice has proven that China's procuratorial public interest litigation is the key to solving governance challenges in river basins, he said. Noting that the legislative organs of China are drafting the law on procuratorial public interest litigation, he said he hoped that procuratorial public interest litigation will make more contributions to global ecological civilization and the development of a rule of law civilization for all mankind.
