space Press Releases, News Stories

By Pat Phibbs, Daily Environment Report

Basel Action Network, Greenpeace USA, the Sierra Club, Friends of the Earth, and 10 other environmental organizations detailed their concerns in an Aug. 9 letter to Kenneth Brill, acting assistant secretary of state for oceans, international environmental, and scientific affairs.

"We the undersigned environmental organizations wish to express our strong disagreement with the State Department's recently stated position that [it] will seek to selectively ratify and implement the 1989 Basel Convention while refusing to ratify and implement the 1995 Amendment to that convention," the environmental organizations said.

The organizations were referring to statements State Department officials made during a closed briefing on July 11 about actions the Bush administration may take concerning three international treaties (136 DEN A-5, 7/17/01). One of those three treaties is the Basel Convention on the Control of Transboundary Movements of Hazardous Wastes and their Disposal. State Department officials said the administration is considering introducing implementing legislation that would allow the United States to implement Basel.

Need to Amend RCRA The United States signed the treaty in 1989, and the Senate gave its consent in 1992 for ratification. But, Congress has not passed legislation that would amend the Resource Conservation and Recovery Act to make it consistent with the Basel accord. Until such implementing legislation is made law, the United States cannot ratify the treaty.

The Senate's consent applied to the Basel Convention only, not to a 1995 amendment to the treaty, State Department officials told BNA. In 1995, the Conference of the Parties agreed to amend the convention. Under this "Basel Ban," countries that are part of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development are prohibited from exporting hazardous waste for disposal or recycling to developing countries.

Ban Said to Inhibit Trade

State Department officials told BNA they do not intend to seek consent to the 1995 ban, because it inhibits trade and does not provide additional environmental protection. The coalition, however, described the Basel Ban as "the most significant achievement to date for international environmental justice."

"For most of the world, the adoption of the Basel Ban was seen as the beginning of the end of a sad chapter of 'toxic colonialism,' which saw the toxic effluent of the affluent nations being exported to developing countries, endangering the health and environment of peoples that can ill afford more problems," the coalition said.

"We believe, that unless the United States accedes to all of the Basel Convention, including the Basel Ban Amendment, the United States must not accede to the treaty at all," the coalition said.