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HIGH HOPES FOR AGREEMENT ON HAZARDOUS WASTES LIABILITY REGIME

Press Release, Basel Convention Secretariat

GENEVA, Switzerland, 17 August 1999 -- Delegates from over 100 countries will meet in Geneva from 30 August to 3 September under the chairmanship of Ms. Perla de Alfaro of El Salvador in an effort to finalize the text of a Protocol on Liability and Compensation for Damage Resulting from Transboundary Movements of Hazardous Wastes and their Disposal.

The negotiations, which started in 1993, are a response to developing country concerns about their lack of financial and technological capacity for cleaning up unwanted hazardous waste dumps and spills on their territory.

If finalized here next week, the Protocol's adoption will be a major item at the Fifth Meeting of the Conference of the Parties (COP-5) of the Basel Convention. The conference, to be held from 6 to 10 December 1999 in Basel, Switzerland, will be attended by ministers and will celebrate the Convention's tenth anniversary.

In addition to recognizing the Convention's accomplishments during its first decade, COP-5 will seek to set the global agenda for reducing the risks of hazardous wastes over the next ten years. Other critical issues to be addressed include the ban on exporting hazardous wastes from developed to developing countries, the prevention of illegal traffic, creation of an emergency fund, the need to minimize the generation of hazardous wastes at source, and the complex job of dismantling ships.

The Basel Convention was adopted in March 1989 and entered into force in May 1992. It has 130 Parties. Note to journalists: For more information please contact Mr. Per Bakken on tel: (+41-22) 917 8213, fax: (+41-22) 797 3454, email: per.bakken@unep.ch or Mr. Michael Williams on (+41-22) 917 8242/44, fax: (+41-22) 797 3464, email: michael.williams@unep.ch. Official documents and other information on the Basel Convention are available on the Internet at http://www.basel.int/

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