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Brazil takes action over British waste shipments
Sao Paulo (AFP) July 31, 2009 Brazil has taken stern action after discovering 1,400 tons of waste from Britain in its ports, fining companies involved and reporting the matter to a world authority, officials said Friday. Six companies that imported and transported the waste -- which include condoms, syringes and used baby diapers -- have been fined a total of 1.3 million dollars, Brazil's environment ministry said in a statement. Brazil has also reported Britain to the top international body overseeing the trade in hazardous waste, according to a Brazilian diplomat in Geneva. "How is it possible for countries that say they are doing everything to protect the environment... to do this, to send their domestic, chemical and industrial garbage to poor and developing countries to be burned or buried?" Brazilian Environment Minister Carlos Minc asked in a statement issued in Brazil. Britain this week started the process of repatriating the 89 containers of the waste for disposal. It also arrested three people in Swindon, southeast England, where the shipments originated. The waste had been brought into Brazil over recent months improperly labeled as plastic for recycling. On opening the containers, officials discovered diapers, syringes, condoms, batteries, food remains, cloth, and used packages of cleaning products. The discovery has been reported to the secretariat of the Basel Convention, an agreement signed by 172 countries which regulates cross-border movements of hazardous waste and their disposal. That body was set up in the 1990s as a response to a growing wave of toxic waste dumping in eastern Europe and developing countries, mainly by private firms from industralised nations. According to Brazil's environment ministry, in 1992 chemical waste sent to Brazil from developed countries contaminated port workers, and in 2004 Belgium sent tons of industrial waste to Brazil containing lead and other toxic metals. Share This Article With Planet Earth
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