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"It's like we have been locked out of the most important talks," said Nityanand Jayaraman, India's spokesman for the environmental group Greenpeace, on the fringes of the fourth conference on the Basle Convention.

The five-day meeting began on Monday in Kuching, capital of the east Malaysian state of Sarawak on Borneo island.

It is being attended by around 300 mostly government officials from about 120 countries. About 50 environmentalists are participating as observers at the conference, which aims to reduce trans-boundary movement of toxic waste to a minimum.

Greenpeace is among the observers at the conference.

Jayaraman said the environmentalists have been prevented from attending important working group sessions at the meeting, which would decide on whether rich countries can still dump toxic waste in some poor nations.

"These working groups are where most of the deliberations on the course of this meeting are taking place," he said. "Not to be there could put us at a disadvantage."

An extension of the Basle Convention says that no developing country can receive waste from any rich nation or member of the Organisation of Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD).

But Greenpeace said on Tuesday that the 29-member OECD has been trying to justify such exports to a list of countries -- under a charter called "Annex 7" -- which apparently do not mind receiving toxic waste.

Greenpeace said Israel, Monaco and Slovenia are among those who had "offered themselves" to come under Annex 7.

Jayaraman said developing countries offering to accept toxic waste usually did so because they could make money processing the waste.

"They may be able to get about 70 percent commercial gain from the basic material that makes the waste," he said.

"That's fine with us, but what's worrying is the remaining 30 percent will be highly toxic concentrate which is usually dumped in open fields and drains."

Jim Puckett, director of the Basle Action Network, another environmental group, said the exclusion of the green activists from the meeting was a "trick of diplomacy which opened up an agenda" for the OECD.

"Today, we heard, from second-hand information, that a small group of countries (including) India, Chile and the Philippines are seeking to look at the criteria (for the Annex 7), which we feel is very dangerous," he said.

The Basle Convention on the control of trans-boundary hazardous waste and its disposal was developed under the auspices of the United Nations and enforced since May 1992. The so called Basle Ban has been in force since January 1 this year.

(Kuala Lumpur newsroom, +60 3 201-4813 fax +60 3 232-6752, kuala.lumpur.newsroom@reuters.com)