THE APPLICABILITY OF THE TRADITIONAL CIVIL LIABILITY RULES ON ENVIORNMENTAL CASES IN THE ARAB REPUBLIC OF EGYPT

Abstract

Environmental pollution and its legal cases should become a priority in the agenda of reform and development taking place in the Arab Republic of Egypt. The first steps to preserve and protect the environment against pollution is to establish an appropriate and effective legal framework for providing such protection. Acordingly, the purpose of this research is to examine the civil liability rules stipulated in the Egyptian Civil Code in order to propose appropriate legal rules that suits the special nature of environmental issues so that an effective legal protection for the Egyptian environment be provided. This examination shall be made through following analytical descriptive method. The descriptive method shall be applied in order to describe and examine the legal rules stipulated in the civil and environmental laws in Egypt through referring to set of books and scientific theses that triggered the same subject matter of this research. Then, the analytical method that is based on the inductive and deductive approach shall be followed through referring to the European reports and studies that examine and analyze the problem of the research as well as analyzing the environmental cases that has been reviewed by the Egyptian Cassation Court in order to determine the effectiveness of the application of traditional civil liability rules on environmental cases. The researchers concluded that the number of civil environmental cases reviewed by the Egyptian Cassation Court is very few and it has become indispensable to issue special legal rules governing the civil liability of environmental damage that shall be consistent with the special nature of environmental damage because sufficiency by applying traditional general rules of civil liability will not provide the necessary protection to prevent pollution and environmental degradation.