Buzunko O. Judicial protection of ecological rights in Ukraine

Dissertation is an independent, completed scientific work devoted to a comprehensive study of the judicial protection of environmental rights in Ukraine. The analysis of the prerequisites for the emergence and guarantees of the realization of the right of citizens to judicial protection of environmental rights was carried out in the work. It is emphasized that ensuring the implementation of environmental rights is carried out by entrusting the state and its authorized bodies, their officials with the implementation of state functions, where procedural and legal guarantees for the protection of environmental rights are aimed at the implementation of individual rights of citizens in the branch of environmental legal relations enshrined in the Constitution of Ukraine, national and international legal acts, that guarantee the implementation of the subjective right of communities to judicial protection of their rights and legitimate interests. It is emphasized that system-forming acts of judicial protection are Convention on access to public participation in the decision-making process and access to justice on issues related to the environment and the Constitution of Ukraine, according to which everyone has the right to a safe life and environmental health and for compensation for damage caused by the violation of this right. It is proposed to consider the legal protection of environmental rights as a type of legal protection that is guaranted be the state and consists in the administration of justice for the purpose of proper, timely and effective protection of violated, unrecognized or contested rights in the branch of environmental legal relations by applying measures of state influence to guilty persons. Based on the prerequisites for the emergence and guarantees of citizen’s rights, the author’s definition of legal guarantees of citizen’s subjective rights to judicial protection of environmental rights are provided. The dissertation focuses on the functions of the state to ensure judicial protection of the environment rights of citizens and proves that one of the functions of the state in the field of environment is the regulatory and legal provision of constitutional rights and freedoms of man and citizen. The principles of judicial protection of environmental rights have been determined, which gave grounds for providing the author’s definition of such principles. The place and role of the protection of environmental rights in the general system of the judicial protection is characterized. It had been found that the issue of effective judicial protection of environmental rights requires strengthening the role of the public in the issue of access to court on issues related to the environment. A list of criminal offences against the environment is given and their qualifying features are established. The opinion on the need to introduce environmental courts is supported. It is justified that at the first stage of the introduction of such courts that it is necessary to start with their creation at the level of regions, which takes into account the average number of environmental cases received by the courts, will provide an opportunity to quickly and efficiently consider cases aimed at protecting environmental rights. As part of the development of environmental justice, the idea of creating an online court in Ukraine is also supported, which will be another effective guarantee of citizens’ right to judicial protection of environmental rights. The work also puts forward a number of proposals for improving the current legislation of judicial protection of environmental rights in Ukraine.