space Press Releases, News Stories

by CHRIS FONTAINE, Associated Press

Officials from Greenpeace and the Basel Action Network -- a group focused on toxic transshipments -- denounced Formosa Plastics Corp. for preying on ``a convenient open target'' by sending the waste to Cambodia.

The shipment, which sparked a frenzied exodus from a Cambodian city, ``is an example of the worst case of waste dumping we have seen for a long time,'' said Von Hernandez, a toxins specialist for Greenpeace.

The waste, believed to be compressed industrial ash, passed without notice through Sihanoukville seaport on Nov. 30 and was found by environmental officials a few weeks later in an exposed heap six miles outside the coastal town.

Tests conducted on the waste have shown it contains extremely high levels of toxic mercury, but the environmentalists complained that tests for other life-threatening materials, such as dioxin, have not been done.

Five deaths have been blamed on the waste, including a dock worker who cleaned the hold of the ship that brought it from Taiwan, and four people killed in road accidents during a panic-stricken exodus from Sihanoukville.

A non-governmental organization, NGO Forum, on Tuesday linked a sixth death to the shipment. A 23-year-old villager living near the dump died two days after rummaging through the waste and using the bags it was shipped in to build a makeshift bed.

The group cautioned it had not established a direct link between the waste and the death, but reported that both the dock worker and the villager suffered similar symptoms, including acute vomiting, exhaustion and thirst.

The waste has been packed by the army into oil drums and freight containers while the government waits for Formosa Plastics to fulfill its promise to take it back.

Hernandez noted, however, that Greenpeace was able to take samples from chunks of waste remaining at the dump site. He also said the area has not been sealed off by authorities, and that children were seen walking through it.