Water Crimes in Slovenia

Abstract

The lack of clean drinking water has become one of the key problems of the 21st century, resulting in extreme cases in wars for water and consequent mass migrations. Despite the fact that we live on a blue planet, the amount of available fresh drinking water is getting smaller. For this reason, its preservation is all the more important, because it is needed for survival, and is necessary for drinking and food supply, energy production and industry. Any form of pollution, theft or other illegal activities against water resources is unacceptable and should be sanctioned. Within the framework of the international project: Water Crimes - Inventory, Outlook and Assessment of Emerging Environmental Crimes Against Water in Europe, which took place from January 2016 through the end of August 2017, the manifestations and prevalence of water crime in Slovenia was assessed. In addition to the descriptive method and method of compilation, the review of the literature, statistical data, annual reports and data obtained from the Slovenian Police and the Inspectorate of the Republic of Slovenia for the Environment and Spatial Planning (reading the files and conducting interviews with experts), were utilized. We found that the number of officially recorded cases of crimes against water in Slovenia is low, accounting for less than a quarter of all environmental offenses. The most common forms of crime against water are pollution of water and contamination of drinking water or free water in nature, such as rivers, lakes, ponds, etc. Potential hazards for water are also include pollution of groundwater, pollution of streams and rivers from factories, nitrates, and pesticides due to agriculture and theft of water from systems. In most cases, the perpetrator remains unknown, and this raises the question of what can (still) be improved in Slovenia, which is addressed by the authors in the final debate.