Rich nations treating Asia as 'the cesspit'

Rich nations treating Asia as 'the cesspit'

BANGKOK (AFP): The world's rich nations are treating Asia as
the cesspit of the industrialized world by paying developing
countries to take their toxic wastes, Greenpeace said on Friday.

"Industrialized countries are spending money to dump waste in
less developed Asian countries, and to buy incinerators in those
countries to burn rich states' waste," said Tara Buakamsri of
Greenpeace Southeast Asia.

"We will no longer be the cesspit for the industrialized
world," he said at a Greenpeace-run conference of 12 Asian
nations here.

Tara said Japan is one of the world's largest producers of
deadly toxins and heavy metals, which are emitted into the air
when burnt at incinerators or dumped in poorly-regulated
landfills.

And now it was stepping up its strategy of offering Southeast
Asian states money to build incinerators to burn its transferred
waste, he said.

"It is unacceptable that Japan, which has created an
environmental health disaster in its own backyard ... is pushing
to export its polluting machines."

Global organizations, including the World Bank and the Asian
Development Bank, are contributing to the hazardous waste control
techniques by funding these projects, Greenpeace said in a
statement.

Incinerators have been identified throughout the
industrialized world as the primary source of dioxins, considered
the most potent toxic chemicals known to humankind, it said.

The incinerators sold to developing Asian states "are causing
severe environmental, social and public health problems which
disproportionately impact and dislocate low income
neighborhoods."

Bangkok's city administration has recently decided to buy
incinerators to burn up waste -- its own as well as garbage
shipped in from other countries.

Greenpeace said it has set up a regional anti-toxic dumping
and ecological protection organization called Waste Not Asia to
curb rich states' plans to move even more waste here.

Asia will no longer allow "a toxic technology being dumped on
us by some of the most polluted nations in the world," Tara said.

Waste Not Asia will strive to replace toxic waste dumping and
incineration with recycling and more effective waste management,
said Sasanka Dev, an Indian environmental activist.

"We would like to put governments and the incinerator industry
on notice that we now have the ability, information and skills to
challenge their visionless designs," he said.

Dioxins have been linked to a variety of cancers and
congenital birth defects.

Earlier this year, Japanese authorities detained four
Greenpeace protesters on trespass charges for scaling a building
to protest waste incineration by draping signs proclaiming Tokyo
to be the dioxin capital of the world.

Dioxin incineration "is an ongoing public health disaster in
Japan," said Koa Tasaka, a Japanese heavy metals and chemical
expert at the conference.