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Coalition Press Release
"Exports of ships-for-scrap to Asian shipbreaking yards is a form of toxic waste dumping. Ships-for-scrap contaminated with hazardous or toxic substances are hazardous waste under the Basel Convention. But owing to the global nature of ships and the shipping industry, shipowners and ship-exporters exploit loopholes such as flags of convenience to continue this dirty practice. We demand that new regulations be developed within the International Maritime Organisation to ensure that shipowners and ship-exporters bear the full liability of shipbreaking and that the costs are not externalised to the environment and workers as it is done now. We urge ship-for-scrap exporting nations to follow the example set by Denmark where the police have initiated criminal proceedings against Danish ferry company Scandlines for exporting a ship contaminated with hazardous asbestos for breaking in Mumbai." The trade union and environmental activists have called on the Indian government to demand decontamination of the ships prior to export and to ensure that effective occupational safety and health standards are enforced at the breaking yards and that workers and the environment at the shipbreaking yards are not sacrificed for the sake of cheap steel. Shipscrapping is inherently hazardous in terms of worker safety and health, and this is made worse by the presence of hazardous substances such as asbestos and heavy-metal paints contained in the ship's structure. Because of the stringent environmental and worker safety legislation in industrialised countries, dirty and hazardous industries such as shipbreaking have been pushed to the unregulated shores of poorer countries like China, India, Bangladesh and Pakistan. In Alang, nearly 400 workers are killed every year due to accidental fires and explosions. "Industrialised nations and shipowners cannot use industrialising countries as a dumping ground for their toxic wastes and their worker safety liabilities. We demand that the International Maritime Organisation take the lead to ensure that owners are held liable for their ship's disposal and that ships are decontaminated prior to export to industrialising countries. We will push for this by involving the International Labour Organisation and the United Nations Environment Program," said Mark Dickinson of the International Transport Workers Federation. The Indian Ministry of Environment has also come under attack by the red-green alliance for their failure to implement Indian laws that prohibit the entry of hazardous wastes into the country. "The Gujarat government and the Central government are both guilty of shocking callousness and criminal negligence in abdicating their responsibility to prevent the poisoning of India's coastline and to protect the health of thousands of poor and illiterate workers who work in dirty shipbreaking yards in India," said Vivek Monteiro of Centre for Indian Trade Unions in Mumbai. "We will follow the illegalities of shipbreaking in Indian courts to force the worker and environmental regulatory agencies to comply with Indian worker safety and environmental legislation. Today, the shipbreaking industry is virtually unregulated and run by unscrupulous entrepreneurs, and the Ministry of Environment and labour authorities are content to be mere bystanders," said Colin Gonsalves, Mumbai-based advocate and representative of Basel Action Network in India. Investigations done by Greenpeace in October 1998 in Alang and Mumbai shipbreaking yards, confirms allegations by trade unions and NGOs about the widespread environmental contamination and occupational hazards at shipbreaking yards. Analyses of samples taken during the investigation, revealed the presence of high levels of heavy metals, potential cancer-causing chemicals, asbestos and the toxic biocide Tri Butyl Tin. "Shipbreakers in Asia are using their ability to exploit and abuse workers and the environment as their sole competitive edge. This is unacceptable. If shipbreaking is to continue, the ships must be stripped of toxics before export to Asia, and the breaking must be done without threat to the workers or the environment, " said Nityanand Jayaraman of Greenpeace International. Greenpeace and Basel Action Network are working to ensure that the same environmental and worker standards apply at shipbreaking yards around the world including in China, Bangladesh, Pakistan, the Philippines, and Vietnam. NOTE: Video footage available. For more information, contact: Shailendra Yashwant, Greenpeace: 022 4937008 Mahendra Sharma, ITF: 09811066499 Vivek Monteiro, Centre for Indian Trade Unions. Tel: 022 5642427 Colin Gonsalves, Basel Action Network, Tel: 022 2677385 International journalists can contact: Andrew Davis, Greenpeace. Tel: +3120
5236222. Jim Puckett, Basel Action Network.
Tel: +1 206 720 6426. Jon Whitlow, International Transport
Workers Federation. Tel: +44 171 4032733. More News |
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