Shining World Leadership Award for Justice Recipient: Honorable Judge Elena Liberatori, Part 1 of 2

Argentina with its wide open fields, large mountain ranges and gracious glaciers has truly reformed the judicial system by creating recognised laws for non-humans since 2015. This landmark ruling is achieved thanks to a compassionate, dedicated lawyer Elena Liberatori, who since the age of 14 wanted to become a lawyer so that she may protect the innocent and pure citizens of this planet, our loving animal companions and friends.

Elena also shared with us some insights into the scientific concept of sentient beings’ consciousness. “Because it was thanks to his auspice and sponsorship that in 2012, in Cambridge, a lot of neurological scientists came together, and concluded and told the world that the neurological substrates by which animals and humans feel joy and feel pain are exactly the same. It is important to remember that in France at the beginning of 2015, the concept of sentience is included in the Civil Code. And recently, this year and at the request of Senator Jesusa Rodriguez, who is from Mexico, native corn is a subject of law today in Mexico. So, this is not only animals, today nature, and well, in nature, we human beings keep on being present. It’s a matter of gradually spreading this concept. And that leads to peace, goodness, and to all those values that, sometimes, we feel so lost.”

Elena touches our souls with her decisive, lawful knowledge of how to treat our animal companions and the planet with the love, respect, and dignity they deserve. She became inspired to tackle this agenda in her country’s legal system. “When I am asked what inspired me most to consider Sandra -an animal- as a non-human person is that I never doubted that animals have rights. There is a basic right, on our part, which is of respect towards them. I always say that it is not necessary to love them. But it is our must to respect them.”