UNEP/CHW/OEWG/7/INF/19

UNITED
NATIONS / /

BC

UNEP/CHW/OEWG/7/INF/19
/ Distr.: General
31 March 2010
English only

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UNEP/CHW/OEWG/7/INF/19

Open-ended Working Group of the Basel Convention

on the Control of Transboundary Movements of

Hazardous Wastes and their Disposal

Seventh session

Geneva, 10–14 May 2010

Item 7 (d) of the provisional agenda

Legal and compliance matters: enforcement of the

Convention and efforts to combat illegal traffic

Enforcement of the Convention and efforts to combat illegal traffic: comments received pursuant to decision IX/23

Note by the Secretariat

Attached in the annex to the present note is a compilation of the four submissions received since the ninth meeting of the Conference of the Parties on the draft detailed outline of an instruction manual on the prosecution of illegal traffic of hazardous wastes and other wastes for the legal profession prepared by the Secretariat[1]. The submissions from Canada, the European Commission and its member States, Trinidad and Tobago, and Uganda are attached as received, without formal editing. These submissions complement earlier submissions received by the Secretariat from Canada, Mexico, Pakistan and the United States of America prior to the ninth meeting of the Conference of the Parties, reproduced in documents UNEP/CHW/OEWG/6/INF/7 and Add.1, and available on the website of the Convention.

Annex

Instruction Manual on the prosecution of illegal traffic of hazardous wastes or other wastes for the legal profession

Submission by Canada

  1. At COP-9, in Decision IX/23, the issue of the manual was addressed and the secretariat was asked to prepare a manual based on the outline and any comments and proposals received.
  1. Canada appreciates the secretariat’s efforts to include the comments on the outline made by Canada in its previous submission. We find the outline much improved and consider that a number of our remaining concerns could be addressed once the drafting of the manual begins. Once the secretariat finalizes the outline based on comments received from Parties and others, we would appreciate seeing that version and would send materials for inclusion accordingly.
  1. Our preference would be to have this manual restricted to prosecutors.
  1. Including judges as an intended audience could raise issues about the independence of the judiciary. If judges are included there will probably need to be text included outlining the fact that the judiciary are considered independent in many jurisdictions, and ensuring that the text is drafted in a manner that is sensitive to this. Again, it might also be useful to highlight the fact that there may differences in the roles of judges in common law and civil code jurisdictions (e.g. investigating magistrates).
  1. Much of the content of this manual will have to be filled in by individual Parties according to the specific procedural and substantive rules in their jurisdictions. This does raise an issue of capacity for many jurisdictions.
  1. The Compliance Committee has had the issue of illegal traffic as part of its work programme on systemic compliance issues, and the secretariat may wish to canvass its meeting reports to determine whether there is any information that would be relevant to the development of the manual.

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UNEP/CHW/OEWG/7/1.

[1]UNEP/CHW/OEWG/6/12, annex.