Casos judicializados decorrentes da construção da usina hidrelétrica de Belo Monte

Abstract

The greatness of the hydroelectric project of Belo Monte, carried out under the argument of necessity of reinforcement of the country's energy matrix to ensure national development, generates many and undeniable socioenvironmental impacts in the region where it is located. As a result of these impacts, several lawsuits have been proposed whose purpose is the analysis of due compliance with the legislation that rules the environmental licensing procedure of the project, as well as the changes imposed on environment and on the lives of indigenous peoples and riverine of local cities. In this background, the present study aims to know how has positioned itself the Judiciary Branch when asked to manifest about the socioenvironmental conflicts caused by the operation of UHE Belo Monte, and likewise, whether the judiciary responses are compatible with socioenvironmental jurisprudence of the Inter-American Court of Human Rights. The study has a research subject a group of seventeen legal actions filed by federal prosecutors in the period from 2001 to the year 2014, that (still) are in progress in the Federal Justice. Comparing the judgments to the Inter-American Court of Human Rights's jurisprudence, it is clear that in several cases, was not adopted the perspective of this International Court concerning the rights to life, previous consultation, free and informed the indigenous peoples, access to justice, and about the precaution and the polluter pays's principies.