Scholarly record

THE (NON) RESPECT OF ENVIRONMENTAL LEGISLATION AS A FUNDAMENTAL HUMAN RIGHT VIOLATION IN REPUBLIC OF KOSOVO

Dukagjin Leka

Abstract

The Republic of Kosovo is one of the newest states in the world. Separated from a former communist federation ? Yugoslavia and occupied for over a decade by Serbia, it turned out to be free after a systematic destruction and with great consequences in all respects, including the environment. And of course, being a new state, made Republic of Kosovo to inherit many problems, which were very difficult to solve, while the environmental issues did not even come into the agenda ever to be discussed. In other words, having many major problems, the environmental issue as to the international community that has governed Kosovo for more than a decade, as well as for Kosovo's institutions itself, has never become an issue of importance to be discussed nor to be protected. Even after some positive developments in Kosovo's environmental legislation, by adopting the law on environmental protection, by creating a state agency for environmental protection, by creating environmental directorates in municipalities, etc., which developments and steps failed to become successful, because they lacked their implementation in practice. Therefore, even in spite of a good decision by the Government of Kosovo to include the ecological tax on vehicle registration ? which has been paid for all these years by Kosovo citizens had no results, because the destination of that tax is the general budget of the Republic of Kosovo and does not go directly to the destination of environment protection, for which is paid by the citizens of the Republic of Kosovo. Then many ad-hoc decisions of the Government of Kosovo have made it come to the conflicts of laws that they have adopted, such as permitting car clearance in Kosovo even older than 10 years from its produce, a decision that depending on the governments and depending from the need to fill the Kosovo budget has been suspended or put in place for implementation in practice, because the Kosovo budget is mainly filled in through customs taxes, and this decision helped to fill the budget, but not caring at all on environment. This has led to (non) respect for environmental rights in Kosovo being also one of the most flagrant violations of human rights, given that in other aspects of respecting the human rights, Kosovo has made many steps forward. This paper will outline the situation in environmental protection in Kosovo and the developments that have followed Kosovo regarding the environment protection, by not forgetting to mention the recent negative developments regarding the pollution, especially in Pristina, which came to the first place in the world as the most polluted city. This article will bring the focus on the all kind (mal) practices, especially in the implementation of legislation in Kosovo, which have to do with environmental protection, and will include different recommendations for all the stakeholders in the Republic of Kosovo, in order to change the environmental protection and increase the standards of non-violation of human rights, which covers also the environmental rights, based on best practices of European Union.

Publication Impact Profile

• Captures
• Mendeley - Readers: 3

PLUMX see details

DOI resolver: doi.org/10.5593/sgem2018/5.4/s23.071

Publication details

Back to publication list