The EU’s Executive proposed tougher environmental laws on Friday the 10th of February. The measure if passed by the European Parliament would allow European Courts to punish companies, within the 27 member states, with prison sentences of up to five years and a potential fine of $975,000. The European Environmental Commissioner Stavros Dimas used the environmental disaster in the Ivory Coast as a prime example of why such laws needed to come into existence reasoning that “the recent hazardous waste disaster in the Ivory Coast shows how environmental crimes can have devastating effects on people and the environment.” His case was supported by another heavyweight within the EU executive, Justice Commissioner Franco Frattini who said the proposals needed to be made law in order to guarantee that there are no “safe havens for environmental crimes within the EU.”