Pollution: Amsterdam to be sued over Trafigura fiasco
The city of Amsterdam is to be prosecuted over the dumping of toxic waste by a ship in Ivory Coast in 2006
17.03.2010 |IPEN
The report notes that the Supreme Court has referred the case back to the Amsterdam district court to be considered afresh. In August 2006, the Probo Koala ship, chartered by Dutch-based multinational oil trading firm Trafigura, dumped deadly caustic soda and petroleum residues on city waste tips in Abidjan, having been prevented from offloading in Amsterdam. Dutch prosecutors have sought to hold the city responsible for ‘ridding itself’ of what turned out to be dangerous waste being offloaded from the Probo Koala in Amsterdam – by ordering that it be pumped back into the ship to be taken elsewhere. Full report in The Times
Meanwhile, people from Ivory Coast who said they had been made ill by dumped waste have begun to receive compensation cheques after a four-year legal battle. According to a BBC News report, hundreds of Ivorians – many of them without bank accounts – queued for hours to receive their cheques.Some 30 000 people are in line for a share of a $45m payout from the multinational oil company Trafigura. The firm has always denied that the waste was dangerous, or that it knew the chemicals would be dumped. The report notes that Trafigura hired a local firm in 2006 to treat and dispose of its waste – but the chemicals were eventually dumped in the main city, Abidjan. Full BBC News report
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