Aussie senator calls for boycott of RI sandals

Aussie senator calls for boycott of RI sandals

SYDNEY (AFP): An Australian senator called yesterday for a
national boycott of Indonesian rubber sandals after thousands of
the discarded items washed up on a remote group of Australian
islands in the Indian Ocean.

Senator Julian McGauran, a member of the ruling conservative
coalition, alleged the Cocos and Keeling Islands were being
inundated with discarded sandals, or thongs, which had been
dumped into the ocean by Indonesian manufacturers.

"I've contacted the major stores who have those thongs on
their shelves and the major environmental groups and called for a
consumer boycott -- so I've spread the word and I would hope they
all react," he said.

"The pristine image of the giant turtles on white sandy
beaches shaded by tropical flora being swamped by hundreds of
smelly old thongs is environmental vandalism," McGauran, a member
of Australia's upper house, said.

The assistant shire clerk of the Cocos-Keeling Islands Shire
Council, Norr Anthoney, said the thongs had been washing up on
the islands' shores for years but the problem had been getting
progressively worse.

"If you walk five to ten meters you can usually pick up
yourself a pair. Last time we had a clean-up was last year, but
by the time we collect them, the next day they are there again,"
he said.

McGauran, who visited the islands recently, alleged his
investigations had revealed the thongs were coming from
Indonesian-based exporters, who were dumping waste products into
the ocean.

The senator alleged he had confirmed the source through the
Australian Department of Foreign Affairs (DFAT) and the
Australian Nature and Conservation Agency (ANCA).

But a DFAT spokesman said although the department had
investigated the thongs -- marked with the Indonesian Swallow and
Alba brands -- it had been unable to rule out the possibility
they were manufactured under licence in another country.

McGauran said "all the evidence points to it being
Indonesia ... Indonesia is a big thong maker, and there is no
other land mass between it and the Cocos Islands."

"I hope our relations with Indonesia haven't become so
delicate and manicured and sycophantic that we can't tell the
truth -- and that is that Indonesia is treating us like a rubbish
heap.

"Rising economies are all very good but there is always an
environmental cost. Indonesia is not paying for their notoriously
slack environmental laws -- we are," he said.

However, ANCA's Graeme Marshall said: "We are worried about
all forms of pollution, but we place thongs fairly well down the
list."

"Fishing lines and nets and plastic bags pose a much more
significant danger to marine mammals and are of more concern to
us than a few thongs," he said.

"Nets are synthetic and don't decompose very rapidly, but
thongs break down fairly well and most of them ones that end up
on the beach are a shadow of their former selves."

Marshall, who said ANCA also had not confirmed the source of
the thongs, said the Cocos Islands' horseshoe-shaped geography
meant they collected more than their fair share of rubbish.

The Cocos and Keeling Islands lie some 2,000 kilometers (1,240
miles) northwest of Australia. They were handed over to Australia
by the British in 1955 after being administered as part of
Singapore, then a British colony.