Ban-Asbestos-India: CANADA OBSTRUCTING UN CONVENTION OVER ASBESTOS

Thursday, August 14, 2008

CANADA OBSTRUCTING UN CONVENTION OVER ASBESTOS

CANADA OBSTRUCTING UN CONVENTION OVER ASBESTOS

Canada is a major supplier of asbetsos to India

A U.N. Convention (the Rotterdam Convention) that protects developing countries from severely hazardous chemicals and pesticides is on its death bed due to obstruction by Canada.

Canada has obstructed the Convention by refusing to allow chrysotile asbestos to be listed as a hazardous substance, even though the Convention’s expert scientific body has repeatedly called for its listing, pointing out that it meets every scientific and legal criterion in the Convention.

Listing would mean that asbestos exporting countries, such as Canada, would have to obtain prior informed consent before they could export asbestos to developing countries.

"Canada is putting the integrity of the Rotterdam Convention in jeopardy in order to protect its failing asbestos industry," said Dr. Kapil Khatter, President of the Canadian Association of Physicians for the Environment. “We in Canada have this right. Why is our government denying this right to people in developing countries? Are their lives not equally valuable?”

Canada has been the lead country to block the listing of asbestos by denying consensus with the support of Kyrgyzstan, Iran, India, Ukraine and Peru. 99% of asbestos exported around the world today is chrysotile asbestos.

“Canada’s obstruction has made the Convention unworkable,” said Kathleen Ruff, former director of the B.C. Human Rights Commission. “It has forced U.N. officials to circulate proposals to re-write the Convention with a complex system of dual standards and exemptions, which would be a disaster. It would gut the Convention and put commercial interests ahead of human health. This is not what Canadians want.”

It is no more a secret that politicians in Canada, Russia and India are working in tandem with the chrysotile asbestos industry to willfully expose uninformed workers and consumers to killer fibers by cooking scientific and medical studies, said Gopal Krishna, Ban Asbestos Network of India (BANI).

The expert committee’s recommendation to list chrysotile asbestos will be put forward one more time at a crucial Conference in Rome October 27-31. U.N. officials and many others fear that Canada will once more refuse to allow asbestos to be listed, causing a crisis for the survival of the Convention.

“This is a tragedy for public health, a victory for the asbestos lobby and an ignoble reflection on Canada, said Geoffrey Tweedale, joint author of Defending the Indefensible: The Global Asbestos Industry and Its Fight for Survival.

“95% of Canada’s asbestos is exported to developing countries, where it is handled by workers with few protections,” said Barry Castleman, an internationally respected occupational health expert. “Canada is immorally creating a public health catastrophe in these countries”

“We call on the Canadian government to stop blocking the Convention and allow chrysotile asbestos to be listed,” said Fe de Leon, Researcher of the Canadian Environmental Law Association.

Contact:

Kathleen Ruff, 250-847-1848, kruff@bulkley.net

Dr Kapil Khatter, 613-864-9591, kapil1@sympatico.ca

Barry Castleman, 301-933-9097, barry.castleman@gmail.com

Gopal Krishna, Ban Asbestos Network of India (BANI)New Delhi, Mb: 9818089660, E-mail:krishnagreen@gmail.com

1 comment:

Finian said...: WTF? Canada sells asbestos to India???; September 6, 2008 at 6:56 PM

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Ban on Asbestos is a Must

A study in a peer-reviewed journal had earlier estimated that there could be more than 6,000 workers affected by asbestosis (an untreatable lung ailment) and another 600 suffering at the minimum from asbestosis-related lung cancer in India at present. Occupational cancer from asbestos, the disease caused by emissions at the work place, poses an increasingly serious health problem. But the subject has attracted relatively little attention from industry, labour, public health bodies or the medical profession. Asbestos is one of the single largest sources of occupational cancer. Indian polticians are acting as if they are bonded workers of asbestos industry.

World Trade Center, New York collapsed Thousands of tons of asbestos became airborne.

Back in 1981, there was research coming out that Asbestos was cancer causing and this ad was in rebuttal to that research touting the benefits of using Asbestos. The text over the Twin Towers states, "When the Fire Alarm Went Off, It Took Two Hours to Evacuate New York's World Trade Center." I do not need to remind anyone of the images of September 11th and this ad. The copy below the ad goes on to mention all of the places that Asbestos was used in the World Trade Center. I can not not think of all of the innocent victims in the area that were exposed to all of the dust, smoke and inherent asbestos that was in the air after the buildings collapsed. The cloud of smoke went across the entire city and potentially exposed hundreds of thousands of individuals to asbestos. Hopefully there can be a cure or treatment for Mesothelioma before all of these potential victims are diagnosed.

Apex Court allocates meagre compensation for asbetsos victims

In 1995, the Supreme Court of India fixed Rs 1 lakh compensation amount and identified National Institute of Occupational Health (NIOH) as the final authority to certify asbestosis cases. Compensations are given through the Employees State Insurance Corporation (ESIC). Two workers in Ahmedabad Electricity Company diagnosed as having asbestosis by NIOH have been compensated by Gujarat High Court. Twenty-five workers in asbestos jointing and packing industry at Mumbai were compensated by the Special medical board of ESIC. The court ruled that the industrial units must maintain a health record of every worker up to a minimum period of 40 years; insure workers under the Employees State Insurance Act or Workmen’s Compensation Act and give health coverage to every worker.

Asbestos Victims

Every day estimated 30 deaths in India is under way due to the ongoing trade and use of white asbestos. 'Asbestos' in Greek means 'indestructible'. Greeks called asbestos the 'magic mineral'. Asbestos is a generic term, referring usually to six kinds of naturally occuring mineral fibres. Of these six, three are used more commonly. Chrysotile is the most common, accounts for almost 90 per cent of the asbestos used in the industry, but it is not unusual to encounter Amosite or Crocidolite as well. Though Crocidolite asbestos is banned in India, it can still be found in old insulation material, old ships that come from other countries for wrecking in India. All types of asbestos tend to break into very tiny fibre, almost microscopic. In fact, some of them may be up to 700 times smaller than human hair. Because of their small size, once released into the air, they may stay suspended in the air for hours or even days. Asbestos fibres are virtually indestructible. They are resistant to chemicals and heat, and are very stable in the environment. They do not evaporate into air or dissolve in water, and they do not break down over time. Because of its high durability and with tensile strength asbestos has been widely used inconstruction and insulation materials - it has been used in over 3,000 different products. Where do we use it? In India, asbestos is used in manufacture of pressure and non pressure pipes used for water supply, sewage, irrigation and drainage system in urban and rural areas, asbestos textiles, laminated products, tape, gland packing, packing ropes, brake lining and jointing used in core sector industries such as automobile, heavy equipment, petro-chemicals, nuclear power plants, fertilizers, thermal power plants, transportation, defence.

Make India Asbestos Free

Ban-Asbestos-India

Thursday, August 14, 2008

CANADA OBSTRUCTING UN CONVENTION OVER ASBESTOS

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