January

• BAN releases report of Basel Convention COP5 and critique of the new Basel Convention Liability Protocol.
  
  
• Following the revelation of a shipment of medical waste mixed with garbage that was exported illegally from Japan to the Philippines, BAN worked quickly with Greenpeace and co-authored editorials that were published in major newspapers in both Japan and the Philippines.

February

• BAN participated as the sole NGO and made a feature presentation at a Basel Convention workshop held in Bratislava, Slovakia before government representatives of 16 Central and Eastern European countries. The topic of the workshop was promotion of ratification of the global waste dumping ban (Basel Ban Amendment).
  
  
• In a short report and press conference held in Bangkok, Thailand, BAN with Greenpeace criticized the United Nations Center for Trade and Development (UNCTAD) for their role in undermining the Basel Ban Amendment.

March

• BAN alerted environmentalists in Nevada and journalists in Oregon that Taiwan multinational Formosa Plastics Group (FPG), despite claiming that they would not re-export the wastes previously dumped on Cambodia are still actively planning to sneak it into Nevada via Coos Bay, Oregon. Front Page stories result in Nevada. The Governor of Oregon tells the importing disposal firm to give up the plan. BAN continued to call for FPG to take responsibility for their own waste at their factory site in Taiwan.
  
  
• BAN discovered and then joined with Greenpeace Netherlands in denouncing the secret export by Formosa Plastics Group of contaminated crushed barrels and equipment to the AVR incinerator in the Netherlands that were generated during the clean-up of their toxic illegal toxic waste dumping in Cambodia. BAN continued to call for FPG to take responsibility for their own waste at their factory site in Taiwan.
  
  
• Victory! -- BAN learned of U.S. owned Canadian facility TCI's plans to import PCB waste from U.S. military bases in Japan in order to circumvent Canadian import ban. BAN and coalition raised the alarm and the Provincial Government forbid TCI from importing the waste after it was already loaded onto the ship "Wan He". BAN called for in situ chemical detoxification rather than export for incineration.

April

• In a dramatic standoff making headlines for several days in Seattle, BAN was instrumental in forming a coalition of legal, labor and environmental groups to prevent the U.S. Defense Department from illegally importing military PCB wastes into Seattle for eventual incineration in poor southern USA communities. The attempt to import into Seattle followed rejection of waste by Canada. BAN argued for on-site chemical detoxification.
  
  
• BAN attended Technical and Legal Working Group of Basel Convention in Geneva. BAN Submitted Comments on Technical Guidelines on Medical Wastes alerting delegations to problems of Persistent Organic Pollutant (POPs) by-products produced during incineration of medical wastes and advocated prevention for example by elimination of mercury use.

May

• BAN did press work and wrote letters to the EPA blasting the US military for playing "Global Hide and Seek" with the PCB defense waste after their failed export to Canada from Japan resulted in further attempts to export the toxic waste to Guam, Johnston Atoll and finally Wake Island (where it remains to this day).
  
  
• Victory! -- BAN joined with Earthjustice and other organizations in a lawsuit directed at the US Trade Respresentative's office for not providing representation from the environmental community in the Industrial Sector Advisory Committee (ISAC) for the Chemical and Allied Products Sector. This lawsuit leads to a victory in the courts – a settlement that one such representative is mandated.

June

• Victory! -- BAN learned that Formosa Plastics Group is going to hold onto their mercury waste and treat it in_situ and pay compensation to the local community in Taiwan, thus achieving final victory on our objectives for the wastes dumped on Cambodia.
  
  
• BAN submitted important and provocative comments on hazardous characteristic "H13" for hazardous wastes – which we argued will demand consideration of wastes destined for processes which will result in the formation of dioxins and furans.

July

• BAN joined with Environmental Health Fund, PAN, and IPEN in a new initiative known as the Alternatives Implementation Group (AIG) which will promote alternatives to combustion methods of destroying POPs wastes and stockpiles. AIG will serve as NGO shepherd and watchdog of a new NGO sponsored! inititiative by the Global Environment Facility (GEF) to conduct a pilot project on such destruction methods.
  
  
• BAN prepared with IPEN members, a paper on Best Available Techniques for POPs waste and stockpiles Destruction for the Intergovernmental Negotiating Conference INC in Johannesburg, South Africa.

August

• BAN alerted French NGO, CNIID to the real possibility that the US government will export their PCB waste to be burned at the Tredi incinerator there.
  
  
• BAN discovered that the U.S. government held a meeting in Ottawa with Canadian officials in an attempt to explore options wherein Canada would accept the U.S. PCB waste they initially refused. BAN and Greenpeace joined together in press work to denounce this plan. The pressure led Canada to refuse to accept the waste later in September.

September

• BAN discovered that Australia exported hazardous waste to South Africa in defiance of the spirit of the global ban on OECD to non-OECD waste dumping. Press condemnation by BAN and affiliates in both South Africa and Australia created significant pressure on South African Minister of Environment to respond personally. Despite his assurances that South Africa will respect the ban in future – vigilance is required.
  
  
• BAN submitted to the Basel Convention a critique on the Guidelines for Multilateral and Bilateral agreements. Some countries such as Australia are hoping that such agreements can be used to circumvent the Basel Ban Amendment which forbids OECD to non-OECD waste dumping.
  
  
• BAN blasted continuing efforts by a series of Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) workshops to establish criteria that can be used to allow exceptions to the Basel Ban Amendment and allow countries to opt-out of the waste dumping ban. BAN boycotted the workshops and issued an alert to this effect to all Basel delegates and interested persons around the world.
  
  
• Victory! -- BAN learned that a 3 year coalition campaign to prevent Danish Aid agency DANIDA and the government of Mozambique from burning obsolete pesticides by retrofitting a cement kiln in Matola, Mozambique is successful. BAN advocated not proliferating dioxin producting combustion disposal methods and instead utilize non-combustion methods.

October

• Victory! -- BAN hired international legal expert and worked with certain European governments to put in place arguments to halt a new threat by the OECD to undermine the Basel Ban Amendment. BAN then attended the OECD Working Group on Waste Management Policy in Vienna and was the only environmental group represented. At the meeting some of our argumentation provided the basis for key countries to reject many months of work on this new "Consolidated Act".
  
  
• BAN attended and actively participated in the 17th Technical Working Group of the Basel Convention in Geneva. BAN submitted critical Comments on the Draft Document on the Relationship Between the Basel Convention and the Convention on Persistent Organic Pollutants (POPs), "Hazardous Characteristic H13 - Its Meaning and Importance to the Basel Convention" as well as "The Basel Ban: The First Step Toward Environmentally Sound Management of Hazardous Wastes."
  
  
• BAN attended and actively participated in 2nd Session Basel Convention Legal Working Group in Geneva and submitted Comments on the Draft Guidance Elements for Bilateral, Multilateral and Regional Agreements or Arrangements.

November

• BAN learned that massive amounts of mercury would be exported from a defunct chlor-alkali plant in Maine to India. BAN helped to form international coalition to fight the plan.
  
  
• BAN issued an international press release to blast a NAFTA tribunal decision to compensate the S. D. Meyers Company for profit losses due to a Canadian PCB export ban. The decision was the first trade agreement to openly undermine the Basel Convention and BAN was the only organization outside of Canada to publicly denounce this decision.

December

• BAN affiliate groups attended the Fifth Intergovernmental Negotiating Conference of the new treaty on persistent organic pollutants and distributed a BAN briefing paper entitled ‘Warning: Basel Convention is Ill-Equipped to Deal with POPs Waste". This paper was very influential and helped ensure that both the POPs and Basel Convention will be involved in deciding policy and obligations on POPS waste.
  
  
• BAN had article entitled "The Basel Treaty's Ban on Hazardous Waste Exports: An Unfinished Success Story published in influential trade journal – International Environment Reporter.
  
  
• BAN joined in creating press furore in India and USA once it was revealed that part of the mercury shipment from the USA to India had already set sail for Bombay. BAN joined other groups in calling for its return.