I did sell all my stock in UC after that - as a matter of fact I am
having a hard time trying to invest responsibly. Anyone have suggestions?
Keith Addison wrote:
Hello Mike
How was the Bhopal case handled?
It wasn't handled at all, it was grossly mishandled and is still being
grossly mishandled. It's not a "case", it's an atrocity. It's a whole
bunch of atrocities.
From a previous message :
In a message dated 2/23/2004 7:30:44 AM Central Standard Time,
[EMAIL PROTECTED] writes:
such as Union Carbide's metamorphosis into Dow Chemicals after its
corporate terrorism in Bhopal (1984). As I understood it, there was
terrorism, but not by Union Carbide. Someone sabotaged the plant.
Can you clue us in on what really happened? Please? I'd really like
to know what happened and how and who was at fault.
Damn... Sorry - same problem, a bulging file of info, 5.6Mb of it,
129 documents, have to pare it down. Yeah, well, okay...
Bhopal was and still is today an appalling atrocity, still ongoing
after 20 years, a major crime against humanity and something we all
should know about. And be outraged about. So pardon my mumblings, I'm
glad that you ask. You'll have to spend some time doing some
research, but all the information is ready to hand, you just have to
read it. The bald, bare facts are quite bad enough, but the full
picture in all its sickening detail is far worse, and it's important
to get the full picture. I hope your stomach is strong.
It's not at all what you think - the "sabotage" story is just a part
of the considerable amount of disinfo and evasion generated by
UC/Dow, and even were it true, what the saboteur is alleged to have
done should not have had those results, it should have been 100%
impossible. Instead, it was just waiting to happen, and the company
knew it.
- Though the design of the methyl isocyanate (MIC) unit at Bhopal was
based on Union Carbide's West Virginia plant, grossly lower standards
were employed in the selection of construction material, monitoring
devices and safety systems.
- Union Carbide wanted to save money. Accidental leaks from all the
Bhopal units were frequent, and operators and workers were regularly
exposed to different substances. The factory was running at a loss.
In November 1984 the most important safety systems were either closed
down or not functioning.
- Between 1980 and 1984 the work crew of the MIC unit was halved from
12 to six workers, the maintenance crew from six to two workers. On
December 26, 1981 a plant operator was killed by a phosgene gas leak.
Another phosgene leak in January 1982 severely injured 28 workers and
in October the same year MIC escaped from a broken valve and four
workers were exposed to the chemical. The senior officials of the
corporation, privy to a "business confidential" safety audit in May
1982, were well aware of 61 hazards, 30 of them major and 11 in the
dangerous phosgene/MIC units. Remedial measures were then taken at
Union Carbide's identical MIC plant in West Virginia but not in
Bhopal. In Bhopal, prior to the disaster, environmental safety
concerns by private citizens were responded to by legal threats from
the company and repressive managerial measures were employed against
workers who raised occupational health concerns.
- Secret Union Carbide documents obtained by "discovery" during a
class action suit brought by survivors against the company in New
York, reveal that the technology used at the fatal Bhopal factory -
including the crucial units manufacturing carbon monoxide and methyl
isocyanate (MIC) - was unproven, and that the company knew it would
pose unknown risks. The corporation knew the danger, but regarded it
as an acceptable "business risk".
- Senior Carbide officials, including ex-CEO Warren Anderson, not
only knew about design defects and potential safety issues with the
Bhopal factory, they actually authorised them.
- On the night of the disaster, water (that was being used for
washing the lines) entered the tank containing MIC through leaking
valves. The refrigeration unit, which should have kept the MIC close
to zero degrees centigrade, had been shut off by the company
officials to save on electricity bills. The entrance of water in the
tank, full of MIC at ambient temperature triggered off an exothermic
runaway reaction an consequently the release of 27 tons of the lethal
gas mixture. The safety systems, which in any case were not designed
for such a runaway situation, were non-functioning and under repair.
Lest the neighborhood community be "unduly alarmed", the siren in the
factory had been switched off. Poison clouds from the Union Carbide
factory enveloped an arc of over 20 square kilometers before the
residents could run away from its deadly hold.
- People woke up coughing, gasping for breath, their eyes burning.
Many fell dead as they ran. Others succumbed at the hospitals where
doctors were overwhelmed by the numbers and lacked information on the
nature of the poisoning. By the third day of the disaster, an
estimated 8,000 people had died from direct exposure to the gases and
a further 500,000 were injured. Today, the number of deaths stands at
20,000. Of the approximately 520,000 people exposed to the poisonous
gases, an estimated 120,000 remain chronically ill.
- UC/Dow has ever since refused to provide the technical information
required to treat the injured, claiming it is a "trade secret".
- You'd think that by now the survivors would have received proper
medical care, that they'd have been adequately compensated for their
loss and their suffering, that somebody would have had to answer in
court for what was done to them. On all counts, you'd be wrong.
UC/Dow's "compensation" amounted to 7¢ a day, for 18 years of
suffering. On 7¢ a day they've had to struggle against pain,
breathlessness, giddiness, numb limbs, aching bodies, fevers, nausea,
brain damage, cancers, anxiety attacks, menstrual chaos, depression
and mental illness. Thirty people still die every month from the
effects of the gas.
- Meanwhile the drinking water of the same communities that were hit
in 1984 is being poisoned by cancer- and birth-defect causing
chemicals that lie in the open in the derelict factory, or were
dumped on waste ground by the company for up to ten years after the
disaster. Greenpeace found mercury at levels up to 6 million times
what could have been predicted.
- "As early as 1972, Carbide's American managers talked about the
danger of ground-water pollution from that terrible factory", said
Rashida Bi, leader of a Bhopal survivors organisation which is a
plaintiff in the case. "They made their own proposals to stop it
happening - and then ignored them. Instead, knowing the dangers, they
set about dumping thousands of tonnes of solid and liquid chemical
wastes into and outside the factory. They knew it would poison our
water and our daily lives and they did it anyway."
- In May 2002, faced with a demand by a delegation of Bhopal
activists that Dow assume responsibility for cleaning up Carbide's
deadly mess in Bhopal, Dow CEO Michael Parker suggested that a
portion of the pitiful compensation Carbide paid to its Bhopal
victims should be used to clean up the factory contamination.
Dow-Carbide wants its victims to pay for cleaning up its mess.
- The Journal of the American Medical Association published a
ground-breaking study carried out by the Sambhavna Trust Clinic which
conclusively proves that the poison gases released by Union Carbide's
factory in Bhopal on December 3rd 1984 have had a severe medical
impact on a generation unborn at the time of the disaster. The
findings relate to physical abnormalities of male children born to
women who breathed Carbide's gases. Unbelievably, the Indian tax
payer has been left to pick up the costs of health care, economic
support and social rehabilitation schemes.
- The UC Bhopal factory is still a time-bomb, with tons of highly
toxic chemicals and wastes simply dumped there without any precaution
or maintenance. UC/Dow refuses to acknowledge this, saying it is
India's responsibility.
While we're at the subject of corporate crimes, consider the City of
New York, which prohibited the use of asbestos insulation in the
World Trade Center when they had only insulated the structure,
against fire, up to the 44 th floor.
At that time, long before 9-11, the architect said, "If there's ever
a fire above the 44th floor, that building is coming down." Whose
fault was it that the buildings did not withstand an unusual fire
above the 44th floor?
Six times as many people were killed at Bhopal, and that's just the
tip of the iceberg. Have a look at a comparison of the compensation.
This will give you some idea:
American child brain-damaged by Dow-Carbide pesticide (Dursban):
$10,000,000 Indian child brain-damaged by Dow-Carbide pesticide: $500
When asked if this was not a blatant example of double standards, Dow
Public Affairs Leader Kathy Hunt said: "$500 is plenty good for an
Indian."
(Dursban has now been withdrawn from household use in the US, but Dow
still markets it as "safe" in India.)
For what sum did Carbide find it worth risking the life of a whole
Indian city? Union Carbide stored liquid MIC in Bhopal in huge tanks,
far in excess of what ever would have been permitted in the US. MIC
is a dangerously volatile chemical and these tanks were supposed to
be kept cooled to 0 deg C. It is known that for some months prior to
the huge and fatal gas leak of December 1984, the refrigeration
system had been switched off to save the cost of freon gas. For the
last 18 years, survivors have wondered just how much the company must
have been saving, to make it worth risking the lives of an entire
Indian city. Now we know. The figure was $37.68 per day.
http://www.bhopal.net/oldsite/unproventechnology.html
----------
The details of environmental pollution at the Dow-Carbide Bhopal
plant are appalling -- reading the 5,000-word report is chilling.
It's impossible to imagine how anybody could behave this way: the
charges of "carelessness", "ruthless disregard of safety", "criminal
neglect", "environmental vandalism" are far too mild. Chernobyl might
arguably be in worse shape, but Chernobyl was an accident. The
atrocious mess at Bhopal was deliberate. And it's still poisoning
people all the time.
More than 20,000 people live close to the factory site.
From the opening of the factory in 1969, toxic wastes were routinely
dumped inside the site, both above and below ground. Huge amounts of
waste were simply buried; hundreds of tonnes were not even buried.
Much is "stored" in unidentified sacks. Storage tanks have burst,
spilling tons of lethal chemicals. random sacks of waste, waste
drums, chemical bottles and sundry hazardous items lie strewn in the
open air around the surface of the three chief site disposal areas,
where chemicals were routinely dumped into pits.
According to former workers of the Union Carbide factory in Bhopal,
from December 1969 to December 1984 a massive amount of chemical
substances formulated in the factory - including pesticides, solvents
used in production, catalysts, and other substances as well as by-
products - were routinely dumped in and around the factory grounds.
These were in the form of solid, liquid and gas and caused pollution
in the soil, water and air.
Dumping of toxic materials continued even after the disaster in 1984.
In 1995 the company poured Ortho-dichlorobenzenes directly into the
ground by the north perimeter wall. Nearby residents attested that
within weeks drinking water from the community tubewells became
yellow and foul tasting.
In 1977, Union Carbide built 14 hectares of Solar Evaporation Ponds
400 metres north of the factory and dumped chemical toxic wastes and
by-products at these sites. Every year during the rainy season the
ponds overflowed and contaminated large areas of farmland. Two nearby
tubewells had to be abandoned because of the obnoxious smell and
taste of the water.
Also, toxic effluents were routinely discharged into an open sewage
drain flowing past Jai Prakash Nagar, a community on the South side
of the factory that was badly affected by the 1984 tragedy.
In 1995 fountains of chemical wastewater were being pumped into the
ponds. In 1996 management tried to cover up the environmental damage
caused by the ponds: the toxic sludge was all dumped into one pond
and covered over with farm soil, layers of polythene, and finally a
concrete cover. The two other ponds were levelled (during which their
black polythene liners were ruptured). Now, soil has eroded around
the concrete covers allowing the surrounding water to become
contaminated with toxic material.
Following a 1996 study the Bhopal Municipal Corporation declared over
100 wells in the vicinity of the plant to be 'unfit for drinking'. No
alternative provision was made.
In 1999 Greenpeace International undertook the collection of 33
samples of soil and 22 samples of groundwater from in and around the
factory site. After analysis of the samples, Greenpeace declared the
site a "global toxic hotspot" (The Bhopal Legacy, Greenpeace Research
Laboratories, University of Exeter, Nov. '99). They found heavy
concentrations of carcinogenic chemicals and heavy metals like
mercury. Mercury was found at between 20,000 to 6 million times the
expected levels: and elemental mercury was discovered to be widely
distributed across the plant premises. Twelve volatile organic
compounds, most greatly exceeding EPA standard limits, were found to
have seeped and continue to seep into the water supplies of an
estimated 20, 000 people in the local area.
A leaked government report in 1996 said this: "Water from tubewells
in other parts of Bhopal were examined at this laboratory. However,
chemical contamination was found only in these areas. The tubewells
in these areas were tested five years back and at that time too the
results showed chemical contamination. Hence, it is established that
this pollution is due to chemicals used in the Union Carbide factory
that have proven to be extremely harmful for health. Therefore the
use of this water for drinking must be stopped immediately."
Independent analysis in Boston and other studies all concur in a
nightmarish picture of large amounts of lethal pollutants out of
control in the local environment - and the local communities.
Greenpeace concluded: "As a result of the ubiquitous presence of
contaminants, the exposure of the communities surrounding the plants
to complex mixtures of hazardous chemicals continues on a daily
basis... long-term chronic exposure to mixtures of toxic synthetic
chemicals and heavy metals is also likely to have serious
consequences for the health and survival of the local population."
The local communities suffer routine poisoning, and many of the
chemicals involved have a bio-accumulative and carcinogenic nature.
Local people suffer abdominal pain, skin lesions, dizziness,
vomiting, constipation, indigestion, and burning sensations in the
chest and stomach. Most of the children are born seriously
underweight, weak, with discolored skin, suffering from
multi-systemic health problems. Women complain of suppression of
lactation and some stop lactating within one month of giving birth.
Union Carbide, and now Dow, simply deny it all. Replying to
Greenpeace's allegations in 1999, Union Carbide said it has had no
information regarding the Bhopal plant site since it sold its stock
in Union Carbide India Limited (UCIL) more than five years before -
neatly avoiding the fact that it had plenty of information up until
1994. And so on.
Meanwhile, after taking over Union Carbide, Dow accepted Carbide's
asbestos-related liabilities in the US (paying multi-million dollar
damages) but refuses to accept Carbide's Indian responsibilities.
-----
#1 corporate criminal, ex-UC CEO Warren Anderson, an international
fugitive from charges of culpable homicide and an extradition order
from the government of India for the past 12 years after jumping bail
there, was unearthed in 2002 by a UK newspaper and Greenpeace living
a life of luxury in New York State. American authorities had always
insisted they did not know his whereabouts. "If a team of journalists
and Greenpeace managed to track down India's most wanted man in a
matter of days, how seriously have the U.S. authorities tried to find
him all these years?" asked Greenpeace campaigner Casey Harrell in
the U.S. Greenpeace videotaped Anderson and handed him a warrant for
his arrest. He denied who he was and then ran inside the house. The
journalists discovered that Anderson's local golf club subscription
costs $2700 a year, more than five times what Union Carbide's victims
in Bhopal got for a lifetime of illness and suffering.
-----
Resources:
http://www.bhopal.net/index.php
The International Campaign for Justice in Bhopal
http://www.bhopal.net/oldsite/intro2.html Quick fact tour:
The disaster
How could it happen?
Medical consequences
Today in Bhopal
Union Carbide's response
Union Carbide's toxic legacy
Long-term issues
http://www.bhopal.net/oldsite/poisonpapers.html Carbide's Poison Papers
Internal documents Union Carbide was forced to disclose during the
ongoing Class action filed by Bhopal survivors in the Federal
Southern District court of New York, which alleges that the company
demonstrated reckless and depraved indifference to human life through
its Bhopal operations.
http://www.bhopal.org/welcome2.html
Bhopal.Org
Search for "Bhopal" here:
http://www.panna.org/index.html?searchMode Pesticide Action Network
North America (PANNA)
A history of Union Carbide:
http://www.rachel.org/bulletin/index.cfm?issue_ID=967 #170 - From
Bhopal With Love, February 28, 1990
A history of Dow:
https://www.corpwatch.org/news/PND.jsp?articleid=10008 Dow's
Knowledge Factory
http://www.greenpeace.org/features/details?features%5fid=81509 Bhopal
disaster has no parallel in human history Tue 03 December 2002
INDIA/Bhopal
http://www.greenpeace.org/international_en/news/details?campaign%5fid
=3991&item%5fid=95486 Dow sues penniless Bhopal survivors
Mon 23 December 2002
http://www.greenpeace.org/features/details?item_id=22039 Exposure:
Portrait of a Corporate Crime
Tue 13 August 2002
INDIA/Bhopal
Slide shows:
Part One - Immediate aftermath and the tragic effects of an avoidable
disaster. Part Two - Devastating effects on local people still
suffering almost 18 years later. Part Three - Suffering but not in
silence- Will Dow listen to calls to clean up Bhopal?
http://www.greenpeace.org/international_en/extra/?forward%5fdestinati
on%5fanchor=%2finternational%5fen%2fcampaigns%2fintro%3fcampaign%255fi
d%3d3991&campaign%5fid=3991&forward%5fsource%5fanchor=Toxic%20hotspots
%20Introduction&item%5fid=157595 Bhopal Timeline
You can also access "Bhopal Timeline" via the "Toxic hotspots" page:
http://www.greenpeace.org/international_en/campaigns/intro?campaign_id
=3991
Well, you did ask.
Best
Keith
Keith Addison wrote:
http://www.motherjones.com/news/outfront/2005/07/ATCA.html
Pirates of the Corporation
News: Holding American companies responsible for high crimes
committed overseas.
By Joshua Kurlantzick
July/August 2005 Issue
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