|
space Press Releases, News Stories |
|
BBC Online NEW DELHI, India, 11 September 2000 -- Vast amounts of hazardous waste is being sent to India The environmental group, Greenpeace, says the Indian Government has failed to prevent the country from becoming a dumping ground for toxic wastes. Vast amounts of hazardous material such as zinc ash, lead waste, used batteries and metal scrap were being freely exported to India from industrialised nations, the group says. They include Germany, the United States, Australia, United Kingdom, Belgium, Denmark, Netherlands and Norway. More than 100,887 tonnes of hazardous and potentially hazardous wastes entered Indian illegally in 1998-99, Greenpeace said. This was despite a 1997 Indian Supreme Court order banning the import of hazardous wastes. "The Indian Ministry of Environment's go-ahead-and-dump-on-us attitutde portrays the agency as anti-environment," Greenpeace Asia Toxic Campaigner in India, Nityanand Jayaraman, said. "The country has all the necessary laws in place, but the enforcement mechanism needs to be spruced up. Customs authorities should ensure that such imports do not take place," he said. He urged the government to put in place a regulatory mechanism to control the dumping of hazardous wastes into India in line with the Basel Convention. Some of the wastes were also illegal under the laws of European countries and Australia he said. "Equally to blame are the exporters and exporting country governments which seek to exploit the limitations in the Indian regulatory infrastructure to export their environmental liabilities," he added. FAIR USE NOTICE. This document contains copyrighted material whose use has not been specifically authorized by the copyright owner. The Basel Action Network is making this article available in our efforts to advance understanding of ecological sustainability and environmental justice issues. We believe that this constitutes a `fair use' of the copyrighted material as provided for in section 107 of the US Copyright Law. If you wish to use this copyrighted material for purposes of your own that go beyond `fair use', you must obtain permission from the copyright owner. More News |