IPEN Participating Organization Jagrata Juba Shangha (JJS) held a workshop on 19 October in Khulna, Bangladesh, to work towards and promote a toxics-free future.
The newsletter features updates from IPEN Participating Organizations on some of their work in the region, including from AVD-Kowa Murna, Carbone Guinée, Centre Optionnel pour la Promotion et la Régénération Economique et Sociale Secteur Afrique (COPRESSA), Centre de Recherche et d’Education pour le Développement (CREPD), Propreté, Environnement et Santé (PES) and Association pour la Défense de l’Environnement et des Consommateurs (ADEC).
The meeting convened nearly 100 NGO representatives from more than 30 countries, with over 30 NGO representatives from China. It was conducted with simultaneous English / Chinese translation, and covered issues related to IPEN’s global operation, as well as: chemical safety and pollution victims in China, electronic waste, POPs and the Stockholm Convention, lead paint elimination, highly hazardous pesticides, nanotechnology, mercury pollution and the Minamata Convention, endocrine disrupting chemicals, and others.
A federal appeals court unanimously ruled that Aurora Energy Services, LLC, and Alaska Railroad Corporation are violating the Clean Water Act by dumping coal pollution into Resurrection Bay from their coal export facility in Seward, Alaska. In its ruling, the Ninth Circuit reversed a prior district court decision that the facility’s storm water permit shielded them from liability for the pollution. The Ninth Circuit found that the terms of that permit prohibit dumping coal into the bay, and the court sent the case back to the district court for further proceedings.
