Common use of Severe Clause in Contracts

Severe. The term “severe” refers to the intensity of the harm caused to the environment, independent of its geographic ambit or temporal duration. Severe environmental harm denotes damage 490 Secretary-General Report 1993, pp.7; ▇▇▇▇▇▇▇ (1997), pp.71, 107. See also, e.g. Australia, The Manual of the Law of Armed Conflict, Australian Defence Doctrine Publication, 06.4, Australian Defence Headquarters, 11 May 2006, para. 7.14 (noting that long-term had been interpreted to mean a period of decades). 491 ▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇ (2001), p.536. 492 Final Report on NATO (2000), para.15. 493 See for example ▇▇▇▇▇ ▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇, The Conduct of Hostilities under the Law of International Armed Conflict (Cambridge University Press: Cambridge, 2004), p.194, cited in ▇▇▇▇▇▇▇▇ (2009), p.342. 494 United States, Department of Defense, “Final Report to Congress on the Conduct of the Persian Gulf War, Appendix O, The Role of the Law in War”, 10 April 1992, ILM, Vol. 31, pp.636-637. 495 Secretary-General Report 1993, p.7. going beyond typical battlefield damage.496 Examples of environmental harm that has been described as sufficiently severe include the “dam-buster” raids in World War II. The raids destroyed the Mohne and ▇▇▇▇ dams in order to cut off water from the Ruhr industrial complex. They resulted in the death of more than 1300 civilians and cut off drinking water and energy to 4 million Germans.497 UNEP suggests that this element should be interpreted as “serious or significant disruption or harm to human life, natural economic resources or other assets.”498 There are distinct examples in recent times of commanders launching attacks that resulted in serious environmental harm. For example, UNEP noted that thousands of tons of fuel oil were released into the Mediterranean Sea after the bombing of the Jiyeh power station during the conflict between Israel and Lebanon in 2006.499 Similarly, the current armed conflict in Syria is having a deleterious environmental impact in Syria and Lebanon, including through increased pollution and degradation of surface, ground and marine water.500 In assessing the severity of the harm, the analysis should encompass the direct environmental harm caused by the attack as well as secondary effects. For example, when detailing the harm caused by ▇▇▇▇▇▇ ▇▇▇▇▇▇▇’▇ forces setting fire to the Kuwaiti oil ▇▇▇▇▇, the United Nations Compensation Commission for Iraq took into account a range of factors going beyond the immediate incineration of the oil. Additional environmental harm included the release of airborne pollutants and the formation of oil rivers and lakes from unignited oil.501