Five authorities, including the Supreme People's Court ("SPC"), have recently distributed the Summary of the Colloquium on Handling Criminal Cases Related to Environmental Pollution (the "Summary").
The 15 articles of the Summary are organized into three parts. The first part of this Summary stresses the need of taking Xi Jinping thought on ecological civilization as the guideline for administrative law enforcement for ecological environment and for judicial handling of ecological environment cases. The second part clarifies that all relevant departments shall adhere to the strictest judicial system concerning environmental protection law enforcement, follow the most thorough notion of law-based environmental protection, unify the judicial gauge of law enforcement, and clamp down more severely on crimes related to environmental pollution, mainly including 11 issues such as "determination of crimes committed by entities". The third part requires all relevant departments to further make clear their respective duties, smooth the liaison channels, establish and improve the long-term work mechanism on the linkage between environment administrative law enforcement and criminal justice, including four issues such as the "determination of dangerous waste". Among others, it is reckoned in the Summary that in handling cases involving crimes related to environmental pollution, authorities shall reasonably grasp to what extent the criminal liability will be pursued when they establish that entities have committed crimes, follow criminal justice policies that combine severe punishment with leniency, and focus on punishing investors, business operators and major beneficiaries.