“Criminalizing harm to nature echoes the universal, fundamental law of reciprocity: if you damage Mother Earth, there are consequences,” says Jojo Mehta of Stop Ecocide. “That is an increasingly obvious fact.”

Protecting the future of life on Earth means stopping the mass damage and destruction of ecosystems taking place globally. This serious harm to nature is called ecocide. Mehta and her Stop Ecocide team is working with international criminal lawyers, researchers and diplomats to amend International Criminal Law and make ecocide an international crime at the International Criminal Court. As part of that effort, Mehta teamed up with RAVEN to convene a panel on a webinar, “Crimes against nature through the lens of Indigenous sovereignty”, that took place Tuesday January 19th and was hosted by Jeffry Nicholls, Board President of RAVEN.