The effectiveness of International and European Law in combating environmental crimes using the example of shipment of waste

The thesis concerns the topic of transboundary movements of waste and the harmful effects that such shipments can have on the environment. In focus are international conventions and European Union law that seek to regulate those shipments. The objective of the thesis is to analyse the relevant rules in order to determine their effectiveness and their strengths and weaknesses. Furthermore, the thesis aims to examine new and emerging international as well as European Union legal instruments to discern their capabilities to improve the legal framework. The thesis describes and critically analyses the Basel Convention, the Bamako Convention and the relevant European Union legislation, with an emphasis on Directive 2008/98/EU and Regulation (EC) No 1013/2006. The depiction of the legal framework includes its development process, its relation to other relevant rules, and related criticism. The implementation of the Basel Convention into the European Union legislative framework is analysed as well. Finally, in order to determine the emerging instruments’ capabilities to fix identified loopholes in these legal frameworks, the European Commission’s proposal for a new regulation on shipments of waste as well as the recently recognized human right to a clean, healthy and sustainable environment are evaluated. While the relevant legal framework is capable of regulating the transboundary movement of waste, some shortcomings in the legal framework itself as well as some enforcement hindrances are present, which reduce effectiveness. The proposal for a new regulation on shipments of waste appears well-suited to address those shortcomings and ensure increased effectiveness. Still, some aspects of the proposal could benefit from further improvement