Greenpeace activists challenge the departure of former French aircraft carrier Clemenceau to India. The decommissioned vessel, full of asbestos and other toxic chemicals, is bound for shipbreaking yards where it will be dismantled by unprotected and untrained workers, by hand.
Not if we have anything to say about it.
This morning, climbers scaled the mast of the
Frenchaircraftcarrier "Clemenceau," unfurling a banner reading
"Asbestos CarrierStay Out of India." Another activists buzzed the
deck of thecarrier with a motorized paraglider and a banner reading
"Not here.NotAnywhere." It's part of a day of action inBangladesh,
Geneva, and France aimed at demanding immediate reforms ofone of
the world's most dangerous and dirty industries.
Victory! Update 15 Feb: French President Chirac has announced a dramatic recall of theasbestos-laden warship Clemenceau == it will be turning around andgoing back to France. Our actions, emails to Chirac and an embarrassinginternational scandal left France with little choice but to abandon themisguided attempt to dump its own toxic mess on India.
Clemenceau: the ship nobody wants
Greenpeace has been watching the fate of the site of today's
action,the French aircraft carrierClemenceau, since 1997, when it
was decommissioned. Backthen,plans were to simply scuttle it in
the Mediterranean as an "artificialreef" -- albeit a highly toxic
one. Since that time, theFrenchgovernment and the ship's various
subsequent 'caretaker' owners havebeen trying to figure out a way
to get rid of it, ideally strippingtheship of its dangerous
asbestos and other toxics while retaining thesalvage value of its
22,000 tons of steel.
Years of attempts to get another European country to take the
shiphavefailed. And removing the asbestos responsibly, in France,
issimply too costly a prospect for somebody holding onto a
glorifiedpiece of floating garbage which they've bought in the
hopes of makingaquick buck.
That's when the Indian scrapyard of Alang begins to look like a
dreamcome true for somebody who wants to send their problems away
to aplacewhere environmental regulations are lax and workers'
rights arepractically nonexistant. The French courts have cleared
the path forthe ship to be exported to India by saying its fate is
a "militarymatter" and thus claiming they have no jurisdiction for
keeping theship in France.
There's just two little problems: Greenpeace, and
internationallaw.
Shipbreaking in Asia
The Clemenceau may be one of the largest ships to be sent for
scrapbutevery year a vast decrepit armada bearing a dangerous cargo
of toxicsubstances, asbestos, PCBs and heavy metals, ends up in
ship breakingyards in Bangladesh, India, China and Pakistan, where
they are cut upin the crudest of fashions, taking a huge toll on
human health and thelocal environment. Half of the world's
ocean-going ships endtheir sailing lives in India. Most of these
vessels land on theshipbreaking beaches of Alang (Bhavnagar
district, Gujarat) on thecountry's west coast.
In most shipbreaking nations proper waste management is absent.
Thereare no rules and regulations. And where rules exist,
they'reunlikely to be enforced.
Barely equipped workers dismantle the carcasses of ships
byhand. They haul disemboweled cables out to burn them on the
beach. They useblowtorches to cut through pipes containing oil and
gas that oftenexplode in their faces. Steel plates and pieces fall
off the ships.Andthey are exposed to deadly toxins 24 hours a day.
Lost limbsandburns are commonplace. One out of four workers in
Alang is expected tocontract cancer due to workplace poisons,
making the industry amongstthe most deadly in the world.
Why then do labourers come to Alang?
AskSashi Sethi, the widow of Surendra Sethi, eking out a meager
living inKhaling village in Orissa. After her husband died in
Alang, she warnsother young men not to go. But they tell her in
response, "Ifwego to Alang only one man dies, but if we don't five
will die."
We sayit's garbage
The Basel Convention is aninternational treaty whichprohibits
the export of hazardous waste from rich to poorcountries. We
worked hard many years ago to see this treatyimplemented as a way
of ending the terrible practice of using non-OECDcountries as cheap
dumping grounds for dangerous wastes whichare expensive to treat
properly in the OECD countries where theyoriginated.
The International Maritime Organisation (IMO) claims the
regulationsofthe Basel convention don't apply to ships like
theClemenceau. It's still a ship, goes their reasoning, as long as
it floats, and itisn't waste until it arrives. If the toxic wastes
embedded in theirstructure were removed, placed in a barrel and
then put back on theship, then it would definitely be illegal.
Today, at the Palais desNations in Geneva, representatives of three
United Nations bodies willbegin a three day meeting to discuss ways
to bring the ship breakingindustry under control. The IMO has
resisted any attempt to loosen itsgrip on all ship-related
regulation and bring the industry under thepurview of Basel. As a
concession earlier this month, theIMOannounced plans to develop a
new treaty for ship scrapping. However,itwill not come into effect
for at least another five years and islikelyto place the burden of
responsibility on the breaking yards and nottheship owners.
"Not all of the casualties of this toxic trade are unknown,"
saidMarietta Honjoro of Greenpeace International. Together with
theInternational Federation for Human Rights (FIDH), Greenpeace
visitedthe working and living places of ship breakers in India
andBangladesh,to witness first-hand the story of this human and
environmentaltragedy.
Their
reportfollows thestory of 110 workers who have died during
accidents in ship breakingyards of India and Bangladesh. "The
stories in the report representonly they tip of the deadly iceberg,
there is no record of those whodied of long term diseases related
to toxic exposure," said Honjoro.
What we want
"While the talking continues so does the dying," said Honjoro.
"Thisweek's discussion must conclude, at a minimum, that until the
IMOprovides new regulations for ship scrapping, the industry
shouldadhereto the Basel convention and international human rights
conventions."End of life ships should be treated like any other
toxic materialunderthe internationally recognised Basel Convention
which bans the dumpingof such waste by OECD countries in non-OECD
countries.
Demand safe shipbreaking now
Call upon the international community to accelerate the work of regulating the ship breaking industry.
If you happen to be connected with the shipping industry, you can also play detective for Greenpeace. Help us spot the 50 worst end-of-life ships before they land up at a recycling yard.
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