RESPONSIBILITY OF THE INTERNATIONAL COALITION FOR DAMAGES TO THE ENVIRONMENT: AN IRAQI EXPERIENCE
MOHAMMED SALMAN MAHMOOD *
Department of Public Law, College of Law, Misan University, Iraq and Universiti Utara Malaysia, School of Law, College of Law, Government and International Studies, 0610 UUM Sintok, Kedah Darul Aman, Malaysia
SEENI MOHAMED NAFEES
Universiti Utara Malaysia, School of Law, College of Law, Government and International Studies, 0610 UUM Sintok, Kedah Darul Aman, Malaysia.
SADEQ ZGHAIR MOHAISEN AL-CHAABAWI
Department of Administrative, Finance and Law, Misan University, Misan-Amirah, Iraq.
*Author to whom correspondence should be addressed.
Abstract
The event of the international coalition 2003 war has caused damages to many areas of the Iraqi environment. Thus, the Iraqi government had called for the UN to request for compensation for the serious damages which affected the lives and rights of the Iraqi people. The aim of this paper is to address the legal nature of the right to Iraq in the compensations claim for environmental damages caused by the international coalition war in 2003. The methodology is a doctrinal legal research i.e. library based research, focusing namely on primary and secondary data. The scope of the study is limited to the geographical boundaries of Iraq. This paper concludes that the international coalition war in 2003 has already affected the Iraqi environment due to military operations and the use of Depleted Uranium Metal. Thus, there is a need to resort to the UN machinery to claim the removal of the damages on the Iraqi environment.
Keywords: International law, United Nations, International coalition, Iraqi environment, compensations