Campaigners say don’t let DowDuPont bury Bhopal
Campaigners have marked the 34th anniversary of the catastrophic gas leak in Bhopal, India with a renewed call for justice for the victims.
The Bhopal Medical Appeal (BMA) charity sets out that on the night of 2 December 1984 a Union Carbide plant in Bhopal began leaking 27 tons of the deadly gas methyl isocyanate. The gas spread throughout the city, exposing half a million people.
Some 25,000 people have died as a result of this exposure to date, and thousands are still affected by the leak and subsequent pollution at the plant site.
“Union Carbide has been a wholly-owned subsidiary of Dow Chemical since 2001 and remains wanted for ‘culpable homicide’ for its part in the Bhopal Disaster,” the BMA explains. Bhopal can be seen as “an ultimate manifestation of corporate abuse and one which serves as a template of accountability avoidance,” it added.
The charity says a merger last year between Dow Chemical and DuPont Nemours added layers of complication to the corporate veil sat between those alleged to be responsible for the disaster and proper accountability.
The BMA is calling on people from across the world to sign an open letter to the board of directors of the company to tell them “we will never allow DowDuPont to bury Bhopal”.