ToxicsWatch Alliance (TWA)
To
Shri Prakash Javadekar
Union Minister of State for Environment,
Forests & Climate Change
Government of India
New Delhi
Date: 29th September, 2015
Subject- Imminent illegal entry of
end-of-life vessel Trader (ex HORIZON TRADER) in Indian waters in violation of
Hon’ble Supreme Court’s order, Shipbreaking Code 2013 and Basel Convention
Sir,
With reference to the attached sales
contract and my letter dated 23rd September, 2015, this is to inform you that
the end-of-life vessel Horizon Trader (IMO No.7326233) has changed its name. It
is now called Trader, but it's a dead vessel so there is no tracking. It
arrived in Trinidad and Tobago on the 22nd September, 2015 and left for stated
destination of Walvis Bay, Namibia. The vessel is expected to arrive at the
African continent on November 3rd, 2015. 
We submit that it is apparent from the
sales contract that the owner is liable for breaching clause 4 of the sale
contract wherein it promised that it will recycle it in USA and will dispose of
its hazardous and other waste materials as per US laws. This 42 year-old US
flagged container ship was acquired by when it purchased Horizon Lines in late
2014. A decision was then made to scrap the vessel and it was delivered to the
All Star Metals ship recycling facility in Brownsville, Texas in January 2015.
The original Horizon Lines Memorandum of Agreement for the sale of the Trader
(ex HORIZON TRADER) made it incumbent upon the buyer to responsibly recycle the
vessel in the U.S.A.
We submit that following the intervention
on the part of Seattle based Basel Action Network and Brussels based NGO
Shipbreaking Platform the shipping company has issued a statement saying it has
"decided to expressly prohibit recycling of its vessels in this region
going forward" referring to South Asian beaches of Alang, India,
Chittagong, Bangladesh and Pakistan.
It is noteworthy that the shipping company,
Matson, Inc. (MATX) has agreed to prohibit scrapping of its some 23 vessels on
the beaches of India, Bangladesh and Pakistan in future but this decision does
not address the Trader (ex HORIZON TRADER), an old Matson vessel that is
currently on its way to Indian waters.
We submit that our government must act
swiftly to ensure that Matson, Inc.(MATX) must be compelled to apply its
decision to Trader (ex HORIZON TRADER) as well.
We must recall how disregarding orders it
had previously issued regarding the import of toxic end-of-life ships (May 3,
2012) and shipbreaking (July 6, 2012), on July 30, 2012, Indian Supreme Court
allowed a notorious 213,000-tonne tanker, once called the Exxon Valdez, into
the country for dismantling at the Alang ship-breaking yard. In 1989, the then
three-year old, 300-meter-long vessel caused one of the world's worst
environmental disasters when it spilled millions of gallons of crude oil in
Prince William Sound, Alaska. Since then it has had a chequered history with
many owners and name changes including: Exxon Mediterranean and Oriental Nicety.
It has sailed under the flags of the U.S., Panama and Sierra Leone; however, it
arrived in Indian territorial waters as a flagless ship since the validity of
the Sierra Leone certification had expired. The Exxon Valdez contained a
cocktail of hazardous substances such as asbestos, PCBs, mercury, arsenic,
toxic paints and chemical residues.
We wish to inform you that Supreme Court's
fifteen page judgment dated July 30, 2012 by Justices Altamas Kabir and J.
Chelameswar in a case brought by ToxicsWatch Alliance had directed that no
end-of-life ships will be allowed in Indian waters without prior
decontamination in the country of export.
We submit that in compliance of this
verdict and India's international obligations no owner of end-of-life ship
should be allowed to escape decontamination cost in general and the owner of
Trader (ex HORIZON TRADER) in particular.
We submit that export and import of the
end-of-life vessel in question is illegal according to national and
international laws. Ship owners like Matson, Inc.(MATX) know about the
environmental and occupational health impacts of their ship breaking operations
on fragile coastal environment like Alang beach. Therefore, there is no
rationale and sane logic behind making an exception for Trader (ex HORIZON
TRADER).
We submit that these companies in apparent
complicity with United States Maritime Administration (US MARAD) and US
Environment Protection Agency (USEPA)
have been trying to set a legal precedent for such transboundary
movement of hazardous wastes and end-of-life vessels to Indian waters. They
tried it in the case of end-of-life vessels SS Blue Lady Platinum II and Exxon
Valdez but failed to establish the precedent although the ship remained in
Indian waters due to connivance on part of some officials but its illegality
was accepted in the Supreme Court and by the Union Ministry of Environment
& Forests following our intervention.
We suspect that besides enemies of UN’s
Basel Convention on transboundary movement of hazardous wastes and their
disposal and Ban Amendment, these US companies in complicity with US MARAD are
behind plans to dilute the Ship Breaking Code 2013 to provide for
self-certification in matters of verification of documents. Alang being a fake
document factory, this tantamount to legalizing illegalities!
In view of the above, we demand that our
government must ensure that this foreign end-of-life vessel Trader (ex HORIZON
TRADER) returns back to US waters for clean and safe recycling of the vessel
the way end-of-life French air craft carrier Le Clemenceau returned to EU
waters following an established legal precedent.
Yours faithfully
Gopal Krishna
ToxicsWatch Alliance (TWA)
Mb: 08227816731, 09818089660
E-mail-1715krishna@gmail.com
Web: www.toxicswatch.org
Cc
Shri Nitin Gadkari, Union Minister of Road
Transport Highways & Shipping
Shri Narendra Singh Tomar, Union Minister
of Steel
Shri Susheel Kumar, Additional Secretary,
Union Ministry of Environment, Forests & Climate Change
Shri Shashi Shekhar, Special Secretary,
Union Ministry of Environment, Forests & Climate Change & Chairman,
Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB)
Shri Barun Mitra, Joint Secretary, Union
Ministry of Shipping, Chairman, Ship Breaking Scrap Committee
Shri Ravi Shankar Prasad, Joint Secretary,
Union Ministry of Environment, Forests & Climate Change
Shri A.C.R. Das, Consultant, Union Ministry
of Steel
Shri P. K. Sharma, Under Secretary, Union
Ministry of Shipping
Shri K. Touthang, Director, Union Ministry
of Shipping
Shri S. D. Kaushik, Consultant,
Shipbreaking, Union Ministry of Shipping
On 9/23/15, gopal krishna
<1715krishna gmail.com="" span="" wrote:="">
ToxicsWatch Alliance (TWA)
To
Shri
Prakash Javadekar
Union Minister of State for Environment,
Forests & Climate Change
Government of India
New
Delhi
Date: 23rd September, 2015
Subject- Entry of end-of-life vessel HORIZON
TRADER in Indian waters
in
violation of Hon’ble Supreme Court’s order, Shipbreaking Code 2013
and
Basel Convention
Sir,
This
is to draw your urgent attention towards the entry of
end-of-life vessel HORIZON TRADER in Indian
waters in violation of
Hon’ble Supreme Court’s order, Shipbreaking
Code 2013 and UN’s Basel
Convention on the Control of Transboundary
Movements of Hazardous
Wastes and their Disposal.
I
submit that the ministry officials ought to ensure that the
end-of-life vessel in question does not
present a situation of fait
accompli to the law enforcement agencies by
anchoring and beaching
without compliance with the Shipbreaking Code
2013, relevant Hon’ble
Court’s order and Basel Convention.
The
HORIZON TRADER, a 42 year-old US flagged container ship was
acquired by Matson when they purchased Horizon
Lines late last year. A
decision was then made to scrap the vessel and
it was delivered to the
All
Star Metals ship recycling facility in Brownsville, Texas in
January 2015.
But
instead of being recycled in accordance with U.S. environmental
health and safety laws, creating local jobs,
the HORIZON TRADER was
photographed on September 2nd being towed out
of the Port of
Brownsville with fresh paint on the ship’s
hull masking the true
identity of the vessel. The U.S. Maritime
Administration (MARAD) and
the
U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) confirmed that the
HORIZON TRADER was authorized for export to
the shipbreaking yards in
India. The ship is currently in the Caribbean
Sea.
In
pursuance of previous communications regarding ongoing questionable
activities in the shipbreaking industry, I
submit that in the present
context and in so far as rule of law is
concerned, Basel Convention
alone is valid and relevant to ship breaking
industry.
I
submit that the ongoing transfer of the end-of-life ships fails to
reflect compliance with Basel Convention’s
core obligation -
minimisation of transboundary movements of
hazardous waste, and as
such
will not prevent hazardous wastes such as asbestos, PCBs, old
fuels, and heavy metals from being exported to
the poorest communities
and
most desperate workers in developing countries like India. Some of
the
most harmful materials from dead ships will enter Indian waters
via
a recycling yard, and once it passes through the yard can be
mismanaged or even dumped in the receiving
territory – a complete
circumvention of the Basel Convention leaving
the likelihood of a
toxic legacy for generations to come.
I
submit that while the Basel Convention covers the recycling and
disposal to final disposition. It provides
provision for protection to
India that does not exist in any other
existing international law.
On
behalf of ToxicsWatch Alliance (TWA), I have been working on the
issue of hazardous wastes and ship breaking
for over decade. It has
been
an invitee and participant in the UN Conventions. It is an
applicant before the National Human Rights
Commission (NHRC),
Parliamentary Standing Committee on Science,
Technology, Environment &
Forests, Parliamentary Petitions Committee,
Parliamentary Standing
Committee on Labour and relevant UN agencies
besides Inter-Ministerial
Committee on Ship breaking. It was the
applicant before Hon’ble
Supreme Court wherein the order for creation
of the Shipbreaking Code
was
passed. TWA had appeared before the Hon'ble Supreme Court’s
Monitoring Committee on Hazardous Wastes,
Court’s Technical Experts
Committee on Hazardous Wastes related to Ship
breaking and pursued
cases involving famous ships like RIKY (Kong
Frederik IX), Le
Clemenceau, SS Blue Lady, Platinum II and
Exxon Valdez and others.
TWA
appreciates and endorses your ministry’s position in the
inter-ministerial Ship Breaking Scrap
Committee, Ministry of Shipping
wherein it was stated that “as a matter of
policy they are not in
favour of ship recycling industry breaking
foreign ships in the
country.”
I
submit that India being a party to the Basel Convention ought to
take
the necessary action and maintains its legal competency over
end-of-life ships in order to avoid a toxic
legacy for generations to
come.
Thanking You
Yours faithfully
Gopal Krishna
ToxicsWatch Alliance (TWA)
Mb:
08227816731, 09818089660
E-mail-1715krishna@gmail.com
Web:
www.toxicswatch.org
Cc
Shri
Susheel Kumar, Additional Secretary, Union Ministry of
Environment, Forests & Climate Change
Shri
Shashi Shekhar, Special Secretary, Union Ministry of Environment,
Forests & Climate Change & Chairman,
Central Pollution Control Board (CPCB)
Shri
Barun Mitra, Joint Secretary, Union Ministry of Shipping,
Chairman, Ship Breaking Scrap Committee
Shri
Ravi Shankar Prasad, Joint Secretary, Union Ministry of
Environment, Forests & Climate Change
Shri
A.C.R. Das, Consultant, Union Ministry of Steel
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