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Text | Liu Chunlong, President of the People's Court of Junshan District, Yueyang City, Hunan Province
Yueyang City is located in the northeast of Hunan Province, with the Yangtze River in the north and Dongting in the north, with 60% of the water area of Dongting Lake and 163 kilometers of Yangtze River shoreline. In April 2018, General Secretary Xi Jinping overlooked the Yangtze River at Junshan Hualong Wharf in Yueyang City, and instructed Hunan to "protect the clear water of the river".
In 2018, the People's Court of Junshan District, Yueyang City, established the Dongting Lake Environmental Resources Court, actively implementing Xi Jinping Thought on Ecological Civilization and Xi Jinping Thought on the Rule of Law, keeping in mind General Secretary Xi Jinping's earnest entrustment of "guarding a good river and clear water", giving full play to the role of environmental resources adjudication, promoting the comprehensive, coordinated and sustainable development of economic, social and population resources in the Yangtze River and Dongting Lake areas, and modernizing the construction and protection of the Yangtze River and Dongting Lake with high-quality judicial services. In the past six years, more than 520 environmental resource cases of various types have been concluded. In 2019, Junshan Court was awarded the "Advanced Unit for the Protection of the 'Mother River' and 'Mother Lake' Special Centralized Trial and Enforcement of the 'Spring Thunder Action'", and in 2022, the Junshan Court was awarded the "National Advanced Collective for the Trial of Environmental Resources in Courts".
Be firm in your political position
Layout "River" and "Lake" articles
Shoulder political responsibility. The Junshan Court thoroughly implements the theoretical core of Xi Jinping's thought on ecological civilization, and has always firmly shouldered the political responsibility of the first place to "protect a river and clear water". Adhere to the "ten-year fishing ban" policy on the Yangtze River, establish the trial concept of giving priority to protection, promoting green development, and paying attention to regional coordination, and fully promote the construction of a new pattern of ecological development in Junshan through judicial trials. Resolutely implement the decision-making and deployment of the district committee and the district government, and the judiciary will help the transformation and upgrading of aquaculture, and promote the establishment of the fishery group.
Establish a trial mechanism. Treat the trial of environmental resources as the "number one" project, focus on the construction of the ecological environment of the "river" and "lake", and strive to create a "Junshan model" for the trial of environmental resources. Establish a "green channel" for the rapid filing, trial, and enforcement of environmental and resource cases, build a coordinated trial mechanism for criminal, civil, and administrative trials, case filing, enforcement, and other departments, provide key support from all aspects of personnel, finance, and materials, and equip a 14-person environmental resources court case-handling team to implement a "three-in-one" centralized trial.
Creation of a judicial base
Promoting "pluralistic co-governance"
The Junshan People's Court takes the protection of environmental resources of the Yangtze River Golden Waterway, the East Dongting Lake Ecological Wetland and a number of national forest parks as the entry point, and strives for the support of forestry, natural resources, fishery administration and other departments to build a judicial protection base with local characteristics, and at the same time set up an eco-tourism circuit court in the Junshan Island Scenic Area. The judicial protection base and the ecotourism circuit court jointly play the "five-in-one" function of environmental protection, circuit trial, ecological restoration, legal popularization and publicity, and environmental protection scientific research to protect the local ecological environment.
Establish a linkage mechanism. The Junshan People's Court has established a linkage mechanism with the Yangtze River Shipping Public Security Bureau, the East Dongting Lake Management Bureau, the Junshan District People's Procuratorate and other departments. Through the holding of a seminar on jointly building ecological barriers and protecting the life of wetlands, the judicial protection of the ecological environment was discussed.
Enhance cross-domain collaboration. The Junshan People's Court held the "Two Lakes and Four Waters" Basin Environmental Resources Trial Forum, and signed the Framework Agreement on Judicial Cooperation Mechanism with seven basin environmental resources courts in Hunan. With the ecological and environmental judicial protection base, ecotourism circuit court, and judges' salon as platforms, promote the positive interaction between theory and practice, comprehensively improve the level of environmental resources adjudication, and gradually establish an ecological protection mechanism of "pluralistic co-governance".
Polishing boutique cases
Enhance professional competence
Typical cases have been concluded. The Junshan People's Court paid attention to the adjudication function, and concluded a number of influential environmental and resource cases with high quality and efficiency through the president taking the lead in handling cases, centralized trial and verdict announcement, and live broadcast of the whole trial of typical cases. The first civil public interest litigation case with cross-regional jurisdiction in Hunan Province was concluded, and Hunan Linyuan Paper Co., Ltd. was ordered to bear civil liability for infringement, eliminate the harm caused by the discharge of wastewater to Caowei River and Dongting Lake, and bear the cost of ecological environment restoration. The case was selected as one of the top 10 typical cases of environmental resources adjudication by the people's courts in 2018 to ensure the high-quality development of the Yangtze River Economic Belt. Concluded the first civil public interest litigation case attached to the criminal environment in Hunan Province - the civil public interest litigation case attached to the criminal case of illegal fishing of aquatic products by He and Sun. The case was selected as one of the top ten typical cases of judicial protection of water ecology in the Yangtze River Basin released by the Supreme People's Court in 2020 and was selected into the case database of the people's courts in 2023. The case of illegal fishing of aquatic products by 10 people including Zhang Moujie and Wu Moulong and others covering up and concealing criminal proceeds was selected as a typical case of the procuratorate punishing the crime of illegal fishing of aquatic products in the Yangtze River basin in accordance with the law released by the Supreme People's Procuratorate in 2021.
Pay attention to capacity improvement. The Junshan Court focuses on the practical, basic and urgent issues faced by the practice of environmental justice, and carries out targeted theoretical research. Communicate with the Junshan District People's Procuratorate, the Yueyang Branch of the Yangtze River Shipping Public Security Bureau, the Junshan Branch of the Yueyang Municipal Public Security Bureau, the Yueyang Municipal Ecological Environment Bureau and other departments, hold joint meetings on a regular basis, actively visit the environmental protection administrative departments and environmental protection public welfare organizations, listen carefully to the professional opinions of the fishery administration and aquatic departments, and discuss and investigate with teachers and students of the Law School of Hunan Normal University and Hunan Institute of Technology, and jointly study and solve new situations and new problems in environmental justice and law enforcement. We will work with the watershed environmental resources court to explore new ways to compensate for environmental pollution and self-restoration by those who destroy it, and carry out theoretical research on the management and use of ecological restoration funds, so as to improve the professional level of the environmental resources trial team of Junshan Court. Actively use methods such as replanting and reforestation, multiplication and release, restoration within a time limit, and labor compensation, and strive to achieve a "win-win" situation of punishing violations and crimes, restoring the ecological environment, and compensating for economic losses.
Take multiple measures to publicize
Cohesion and protection synergy
Carry out special operations. The Junshan People's Court actively deployed and carried out the protection of the "Mother River" and "Mother Lake" special centralized trial and enforcement of the "Spring Thunder Action", the "Hunan Environmental Protection and Trial of Sanxiang Tour" and the "Environmental Resources Trial Thunder Action", concentrated on hearing and pronouncing a number of criminal cases of destruction of environmental resources, and quickly tried 113 civil dispute cases related to environmental resources. Representatives and members were invited to observe and observe more than 60 cases involving environmental resources, and the work of adjudication of environmental resources was publicized with the help of the power of representatives and members.
In-depth legal popularization and publicity. In the form of sending the law to campuses, communities, enterprises, villages and courts, environmental protection forums, etc., environmental protection publicity activities were carried out, and more than 8,000 brochures and proposals were distributed to citizens in the jurisdiction and residents along the Yangtze River. Carry out roving trials, move the trial sites of Wu's illegal hunting case and Zhou's illegal fishing of aquatic products into communities and protected areas, and hold on-site court trials, so that the masses can receive education on the rule of law in ecological and environmental protection in the process of observing the trial of the case, so as to achieve the effect of "hearing one case and educating one". Through traditional media such as newspapers, radio, and television, as well as new media platforms such as "two micro and one end", publish typical cases of environmental resources trials, and conduct simultaneous live broadcasts of court trials, fully demonstrating the determination to combat environmental pollution crimes and protecting the ecological environment, so that the public can understand the work of environmental resources trials and support and participate in the protection of environmental resources.
Under the guidance of Xi Jinping Thought on Ecological Civilization, the Junshan Court will continue to implement the decision-making and deployment of the higher courts on the protection of environmental resources, continue to study the new situations and new problems that arise in the judicial work of the ecological environment, further increase the reform and innovation of environmental resources trials, improve the working mechanism of environmental resources trials, build a solid ecological barrier, provide high-quality judicial services for "guarding a good river and clear water", and escort the construction of ecological civilization.
Cover and table of contents of this issue
China Trial, Issue 6, 2024
China Trial News Semi-Monthly No. 340
Editor/Xu Chang