Spain's campaigning judge seeks change in law to prosecute global corporations

Spain's campaigning judge seeks change in law to prosecute global corporations


Baltasar Garzón to push for economic and environmental crimes to be treated as those against humanity at international conference next month

Ashifa Kassam in Madrid
Thursday 20 August 2015 11.05 EDT

He has brought down governments, closed newspapers and ordered the arrests of dictators.

Now Baltasar Garzón, the Spanish judge who redefined the boundaries of cross-border justice, has set his sights on widening the definition of international law to target corporations that carry out economic or environmental crimes.

“Humanitarian and economic crises cause more deaths around the world than all of the genocides we have documented,” said Garzón, who made headlines around the world when he ordered the 1998 arrest of former Chilean dictator Augusto Pinochet in London.

Next month, he and other leading activists, judges and academics from a dozen countries will come together at a conference in Buenos Aires to push forward the idea that economic and environmental crimes be considered crimes against humanity, akin to torture or genocide.

More:
http://www.theguardian.com/world/2015/aug/20/spain-judge-baltasar-garzon-prosecute-global-corporations