The current ecological crisis requires that we transform our international and domestic legal systems to nurture, rather than allow the destruction of the Earth community.
The third International Rights of Nature Tribunal was held concurrently with the United Nations Framework Convention on Climate Change (UNFCCC COP 21) at Maison des Métallos in Paris, France. Hosted by the Global Alliance of the Rights of Nature in partnership with End Ecocide on Earth, NatureRights & Attac France, the panel of judges consisting of internationally renowned lawyers and leaders for planetary justice heard evidence and pronounced judgments on 4 cases after the first day and 4 cases on day 2.
The Tribunal is a unique, citizen-created initiative that relies on the mandate granted to it through the Universal Declaration of the Rights of Mother Earth. It gives people from all around the world the opportunity to testify publicly as to the destruction of the Earth. The Tribunal provides a systemic alternative to environmental protection, acknowledging that ecosystems have the right to exist, persist, maintain and regenerate their vital cycles.
The Tribunal features internationally renowned lawyers and leaders for planetary justice, who hear cases addressing issues such as climate change, GMOs, fracking, extractive industries and other environmental violations. The Tribunal offered judgments and recommendations for the Earth’s protection and restoration based on the Universal Declaration of the Rights of Mother Earth. Among other things, the Declaration binds us to respect the integrity of the vital ecological processes of the Earth. 
Accordingly, the Declaration also helps advance proposed amendments to the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court to recognize the crime of Ecocide. The Tribunal has a strong focus on enabling indigenous peoples and local communities to share their unique concerns and solutions about land, water and culture with the global community.
The Tribunal opened on December 4 with a formal signing of the Tribunal Convention by Tribunal delegates and Indigenous Leaders from around the world. Shown here is the signing by Chief Raoni of the Kayapo people of the Brazilian Amazon and Tribunal Officiates.
Click for President’s Closing Statement
Click for Paris Tribunal Press Release PDF
Please go to the URL to see Canadian participants. And the list of prosecutions.
http://therightsofnature.org/rights-of-nature-tribunal-paris/
CLOSURE was by: young Ta’kaiya Blaney
– – you may remember her at 11 years of age – – pretty amazing:
Shallow waters, song by Ta’Kaiya Blaney “. . . If we do nothing it will all be gone.”
Here she is at the Third Tribunal:
If you want to turn the world around, you need to turn it upside down …
Ta’kaiya Blaney, from the Tla’Amin First Nation in British Columbia