China release 丨 Supreme Procuratorate: Give full play to the role of public interest litigation functions to urge the rectification of illegal mining

China Net September 14th. As an important natural resource, mineral resources are an important material and energy foundation for economic and social development, the valuable wealth of the country, and the construction of national resources security and ecological civilization. A few days ago, the Supreme People's Procuratorate issued a procuratorial organs to urge the rectification of typical cases of illegal mining public interest lawsuits, guiding procuratorial organs at all levels to handle such cases, and at the same time explained the law to allow all sectors of society to pay attention to and do a good job in the protection of mineral resources.

According to Hu Weilie, a member of the Supreme Prosecutor's Inspection Commission and director of the Eighth Procuratorate, in recent years, the market's demand for mineral resources has increasingly increasing, and illegal mining behaviors with huge profits have become more and more intense in a certain area. Illegal mining behavior often leads to the damage of mountains, soils, rivers and vegetation in the mining area, and causes the loss of ecological service functions in the region. It even triggered the risk of geological disasters and hidden dangers of production safety, endangering the health and safety of the masses, and seriously harming national interests and public interests.

Among the eight typical cases issued in this batch, there are 5 administrative public interest lawsuits, 1 civil public interest lawsuit case, and 2 criminal attached civil public interest litigation cases. Eight cases involve a variety of minerals and resource categories such as coal, tomb, sandstone, and geothermal.

In the process of performing their duties, the procuratorial organs used a cross -regional collaboration mechanism to give full play to the advantages of integrated case handling to effectively solve the pressure of the case handling. For example, in the Gansu Provincial Procuratorate to urge the rectification of illegal mining of limestone mining public interest litigation cases, the highest prosecution conducts key supervision and full guidance of the case, and coordinated the Gansu provincial procuratorial organs to clarify the case handling ideas and supervise the classification. Experts from the Supreme Procuratorate and Procuratorate Information Research Center invited experts from the Environmental Planning Institute of the Ministry of Ecology and Environment, and the Ecological Environment Research Center of the Chinese Academy of Sciences to conduct substantial review of the appraisal and evaluation report of the local Institute of Technology, and formed an expert opinion to solve the lack of bottlenecks of local technical power.

The procuratorial organs rely on the local party committee and government in the handling of the case, and coordinate the supervision of the responsible subjects in accordance with the law to give full play to their role to form a coordinated force for the protection of mineral resources. For example, the Procuratorate of Shantou City, Guangdong Province urged the rectification of the administrative public interest lawsuit of Lianhuashan geothermal resources. "Stubborn illness" was cured. On this basis, the Guangdong Provincial Court launched a special actions of geothermal resources protection to urge relevant departments to perform their duties in accordance with the law throughout the province, and jointly protect the science, orderly, and legal development and utilization of geothermal resources.

The procuratorial organs proactively issued cases of cases of governance and shortcomings to local governments or relevant administrative agencies in response to the governance vulnerabilities found in the case to promote source governance and help the construction of the rule of law government. For example, the procuratorial organs in Zhenjiang City, Jiangsu Province urged the rectification of the illegal sand mining administrative public interest lawsuit in the Yangtze River. The procuratorial organs issued procuratorial suggestions to the Zhenjiang Water Resources Bureau and Yangzhong Water Resources Bureau, and urged relevant administrative agencies to improve the law enforcement mechanism and explore a new model of supervision.

In the process of handling the case, the procuratorial organs strengthened their awareness of science and technology. With the help of the experts of the administrative departments and research institutions, they participated in the investigation and demonstration. Through the use of big data, satellite remote sensing, and drones, major cases were improved. For example, the Procuratorate of Youyu County, Shanxi Province, urged the rectification of illegal sand mining administrative public interest lawsuits, and used drones to find clues and shooting fixed evidence. The Procuratorate of Nanle County, Henan Province, sued Wu Moukun and others for illegal mining criminal attachment to criminal civil interest lawsuits. Procuratorate invited experts such as natural resources, agriculture, and water conservancy to participate in the investigation and demonstration of the professional issues of the case.

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