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U.N. TALKS CLINCH TEXT FOR TOXIC CHEMICAL TREATY By Ed Stoddard, Reuters JOHANNESBURG, South Africa, 10 December 2000 -- Delegates from more than 120 countries Sunday clinched agreement on the text of a treaty to curb or ban some of the world's most dangerous pollutants. "We have our convention," United Nations Environment Program (UNEP) spokesman Michael Williams told Reuters after the delegates held marathon talks into the early hours of Sunday morning to finalize the text. The talks, held under the auspices of UNEP, were the fifth round on banning persistent organic pollutants, or POPs, 12 of which have been singled out for urgent attention. POPs, which include chemicals such as DDT and PCBs (polychlorinated biphenyls), have been blamed for deaths, disease and birth defects among humans and animals. "This treaty is a declaration of war on POPs," said John Buccini, the Canadian government official who chaired the talks. "Persistent organic pollutants threaten the health and well-being of humans and wildlife in every region of the world. "This is a sound and effective treaty that can be updated and expanded over the coming decades to maintain the best possible protection against POPs," UNEP Executive Director Klaus Toepfer was quoted as saying in a UNEP statement. "The treaty sets out to control measures covering the production, import, export, disposal and use of POPs. Governments are to promote the best available technologies and practices for replacing existing POPs while preventing the development of new POPs," the statement said. It said most of the 12 POPs are subject to an immediate ban and a POPs review committee will consider additional candidates for the list on a regular basis. Two of the POPs, dioxins and furans, are the unintentional by-products of a variety of industrial processes including waste incineration, and will take some time to eliminate, especially in the developing world. An exemption has been granted for DDT, which South Africa and around 25 other countries say they need for their struggle with the lethal mosquito-borne disease malaria.   A financial mechanism has also been put in place to allow developing countries to meet the agreement's requirements. DIPLOMATIC VICTORY The agreement represents a major victory for environmental diplomacy after the collapse of recent talks on curbing global warming. "This is the first time that the global community has come together and made firm commitments to eliminate chemicals that are directly toxic to humans at a global level," Clifton Curtis, Director of the Global Toxic Chemicals Initiative for the World Wide Fund for Nature, told Reuters. "It has very strong language on precaution in the section for adding new POPs to the treaty," he added. One of the obstacles to the agreement was a simmering dispute between the U.S. and the European Union over "precautionary measures" that would include future POPs under the treaty even in the absence of full scientific certainty about their affects on human health or the environment. "It is a pretty balanced set of statements that express the precautionary nature of the treaty but they are also well-integrated into its scientific structure," Brooks Yeager, the head of the U.S. delegation, told Reuters in reference to the compromise eventually worked out between the two sides. "We got a good result... it's almost surprising but I think everyone is happy. Environmentalists are happy with it and industry can work with it," he said. A treaty at ministerial level is scheduled to be signed in Stockholm next May. Diplomats expect it will take at least four years to get 50 countries to ratify it -- the number needed to bring the treaty into effect. 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