by Ana Paula Rodrigues – Avaaz
Brazil’s President Jair Bolsonaro is a one-man environmental disaster.
He’s greenlighted illegal mining and logging in Indigenous lands, sabotaged environmental laws, and now the destruction of the Amazon has risen by more than 20% in a year — a loss equivalent to 3,000 football fields per day!
He thinks he can get away with it — but there’s a way to hold him to account. A group of brave lawyers is pushing for the International Criminal Court to prosecute Bolsonaro for his alleged attacks on the Amazon and its defenders. And whether or not it happens will come down to a decision by ICC Prosecutor, Karim Khan.
He has a reputation for being tough in his pursuit of justice, but dragging Bolsonaro to court would need a new level of courage. So let’s build a massive global call from every corner of the Earth for him to act, and when this is huge, our voices will be delivered directly to the Prosecutor’s office.
Deforestation was decreasing before Bolsonaro came to power, but under his presidency, it surged to its worst in 15 years. He’s used his presidency to encourage loggers, farmers, and criminal gangs to clear the land, and indigenous people have faced violence so brutal they are calling it genocide.
This is a matter of survival for all of us. Fires, logging and climate change are pushing the Amazon to its breaking point — if nothing is done, scientists predict the rainforest’s ecosystem could collapse, with catastrophic consequences for the planet.
Crazily, there’s no international law against ecocide. But the ICC does protect against crimes against humanity — and this is bigger than Bolsonaro. If the Prosecutor opened an investigation, he would set a historic precedent, paving the way for ending impunity for environmental offenders on a global level. It could even move us closer to a new law against the destruction of nature!
Sign the petition now, calling on the Prosecutor to take all necessary steps to start an investigation into Bolsonaro — and let’s be a voice for the forest, its people, and the future of every human on Earth.
‘A one-man environmental disaster’ is too good to show the Amazon’s deforestation this year.