New Evidence Links Oil Company To Toxic Waste Dumping In The Ivory Coast?
AMSTERDAM — Greenpeace said Thursday it has uncovered new evidence linking a major oil trading company to toxic waste that killed 15 people in Ivory Coast in 2006, and asked Dutch prosecutors to reconsider charging executives with illegal dumping.
The environmental group said it had obtained internal e-mails and other documents that show Trafigura Beheer BV executives were aware the sludge that the ship Probo Koala brought to Ivory Coast was hazardous.
The sludge was dumped in several places in Abidjan by a local subcontractor, and was blamed for killing 15 people and sickening 100,000 more.
Trafigura's managers "knew they were violating the rules by exporting toxic waste from Europe, and it was deliberately taken to Africa to dispose of there because it was cheaper," said Greenpeace spokesman Andre van der Vlugt. "They knew what risk they were taking, and then they prepared a false invoice after the ship left" in order to cover their tracks, he said.
Van der Vlugt declined to say how his organization obtained the documents or verified their authenticity. They have been published on the Web site of the Guardian newspaper.
Trafigura, which is registered in the Netherlands, did not deny the authenticity of the e-mails, but said they don't show the company did anything wrong.
"It is important to place the internal Trafigura staff e-mails published in the UK press in their proper context," the company said in an e-mailed response to questions. "A number of the e-mails display what is simply 'trader talk.' The suggestions apparently contained in some of these e-mails were never seriously considered."
The company has never acknowledged any wrongdoing in the case, and repeated Thursday that the waste it offloaded "could not possibly have caused deaths and serious or long term injuries."
But the U.N.'s top expert on toxic waste, Okechukwu Ibeanu, contradicted that.
"On face value it is clear that there is a direct and indirect connection" between the dumping of the waste and the deaths and illnesses, he told a news conference in Geneva on Thursday.
"It could not have been a coincidence that thousands of people in the immediate aftermath of this event showed consistent symptoms," he said. "It is difficult not to conclude that there was a connection."
Trafigura paid Ivory Coast's government euro152 million (US$197 million) in 2007 to assist in cleaning up the waste without admitting responsibility.
On Wednesday, the company said it plans to settle separately with 30,000 victims.
Prosecution spokeswoman Esther Scheur said the company and several employees remain under investigation in the Netherlands for illegally exporting the hazardous waste, but any charges for the dumping and its effects would fall under the jurisdiction of Ivory Coast.
Scheur said prosecutors had initially included Trafigura co-founder Claude Dauphin in their ongoing illegal export case, but district and appeals courts had both ruled there was insufficient evidence against him to proceed.
"We're very curious to see any new evidence," she said.
Trafigura is privately held, with headquarters in Switzerland. Its Web site says it had sales of $78 billion in 2008.
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Associated Press reporter Frank Jordans contributed to this story from Geneva
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On the Net:
-Greenpeace: http://www.greenpeace.org
-Documents: http://image.guardian.co.uk/sys-files/Guardian/documents/2009/09/16/Final(underscore)emails.pdf
-Trafigura: http://trafigura.com
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TOBY STERLING | 09/17/09 08:40 AM |