V a t t e n f a l l - Sweden´s other face

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LAUBAG's Outline Mining Plan for the Jänschwalde strip-mine was submitted in 1992 and approved by the State Mining Office (Oberbergamt) in March 1994, although the planning approval procedure laid down in the Federal Mining Act (Bundesberggesetz) and involving public participation and an integrated environmental impact assessment EIA, had not been carried out. Approval of LAUBAG mining plan without an EIA – mining plans for all five long-term Lausitzer strip-mines, including three in Brandenburg, were all approved without EIAs – was also a violation of the European Commission's EIA Directive from 26.06.1985.
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LAUBAG and the Brandenburg Government relied on their interpretation of the 1990 Reunification Treaty (Einigungsvertrag) between the Federal Republic of Germany and the German Democratic Republic, which laid down that the Federal Mining Act requirement for planning approval procedures with public participation and integrated EIAs did not apply to planning procedures for mining operations that had been commenced in the GDR but not concluded before October 3rd, 1990. They further argued, that relevant decisions concerning the Jänschwalde mine had already been made by GDR authorities before 1990, and that the fact that the DDR authorities had concerned themselves with the mine, was itself sufficient to satisfy the relevant provision in the Reunification Treaty.
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(The European Commission's EIA Directive from 26.06.1985 was incorporated into German law with the EIA Act (Umweltvertäglichkeitsprüfungsgesetz) from 12.02.1990. At the same time, the Federal Mining Act (Bundesberggesetz) was appropriately amended. Under the terms of the Reunification Treaty from 31.08.1990, the amended Federal Mining Act was adopted for the new East German Länder with transitional provisions.)
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Horno and other villages affected by the Jänschwalde mine, that had been denied appropriate participation in planning procedures, along with the officially recognized environmental association, Grüne Liga Brandenburg, argued that the decisions taken by GDR authorities concerned only particular aspects of mining activities, and in no way amounted to approval of the mining project as a whole, such as within the boundaries laid out in the Outline Mining Plan for Jänschwalde submitted by LAUBAG in 1992. They further argued, that the approval of technical mining plans by GDR authorities did not constitute automatic continuation of the three mines beyond December 31st, 1991, and that as a consequence the continuance of mining activities after this date required planning approval procedures with public participation and integrated EIAs. The legal dispute on this matter has now reached the final court of appeal, the Federal Administrative Court (Bundesverwaltungsgericht) in Berlin, which will rule on a suit filed by the officially recognized environmental organization, Grüne Liga Brandenburg, probably in the summer of 2002.
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