International Maastricht Treaty
This 1992 treaty established many operating rules for the European Union, and it explicitly mandated that community policy on the environment “shall be based on the precautionary principle and on the principles that preventative action should be taken, that environmental damage should as a priority be rectified at source and that the polluter should pay.” (See Title XVI Environment, Article 130r, Sect. 2 on page 37.)
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