On Criminalization Of Seafarers In Ship-source Pollution Accidents

Criminalization of seafarers is greatly concerned by international community. To prevent the further pollution to sea, many states prefer to make some seafarers' pollution acts crimes, which embody the development of environmental criminal law. It is time for China to understand the related international and national legislations, perfect its legal system and make its attitude in international community clear.To discuss the topic, the author divides the dissertation into four parts.The first part explains the importance of doing such research and defines some key concepts like "ship", "ship-source pollution accidents" and "polluting substance".The second part introduces the international, regional and national legislations on the topic. United Nations Conventions on the Law of Sea is the main convention among international legislations. European legislations on the topic are selected to introduce regional legislations. The related legislations in Canada, the United States, European countries and China are also introduced in this part.The third part makes analysis on the component of crime carried out by seafarers in ship-source pollution accidents, including Object, objective aspects, subject and subjective aspects of the crime. Such view is held that the object of the crime is public safety and states' administrative system on the protection of environment and resources; the object shall be different in different cases. In objective aspects, seafarers' wrongful acts, the consequences and the cause are mainly analyzed; the concept of "seafarer" is defined in subject part and some questions are forwarded; subjective aspects are analyzed by comparing related legislations between Anglo-American law and Chinese law, the author also gives ideas on whether strict liability shall be adopted in the criminalization process.The forth part points out flaw of Chinese legislation on the topic, gives someadvice on how to perfect the legislation and make clear of Chinese position in international community.