“We can all learn a lot from the Moroccan experience, a country that is a forerunner in the use of new technologies for environmental protection,” Daems said in an address to the meeting of the Network of contact parliamentarians for a healthy environment under the PACE, which brings together 55 parliamentarians from 32 national parliaments of member states and observers of the Council of Europe, as Morocco’s parliament which has the status of partner for democracy since 2011.
He also said that the Kingdom has accumulated a convincing experience in the management of water resources, access to drinking water, environmental protection, sanitation and reuse of wastewater.
Daems said that this two-day meeting, held for the first time on African soil, is part of the Network’s efforts to participate in the political process to develop legally binding and enforceable instruments to ensure more effective protection of the right to a safe, clean, healthy and sustainable environment.
“The Network is trying to impact national parliaments to establish and consolidate a legal framework, at the national and European level, to anchor the right to a safe, clean, healthy and sustainable environment, based on the United Nations guidelines in this area,” he explained.
For her part, Carmen Morte Gómez, Head of the Office of the Council of Europe in Rabat, said that this meeting provided an opportunity to highlight the role of the Council of Europe in integrating the environmental dimension in human rights, noting that the case law of the European Court of Human Rights and the conclusions of the Committee of the European Social Charter affirm the undeniable interconnections between environmental protection and human rights.
Morte Gómez indicated that the Council of Europe is committed to helping its member states respond to environmental crimes and to strengthening international judicial cooperation in this area, adding that environmental crimes not only threaten ecosystems and the survival of thousands of plant and animal species, but are also the cause of many diseases that reduce life expectancy in all member states.
In this sense, she praised the Moroccan experience in the fight against environmental crime, recalling that the Network of European Prosecutors for the Environment (ENPE) has granted its first Award of Excellence for 2022 to the Presidency of the Public Prosecutor’s Office in Morocco, in recognition of its efforts in this area.
