<nettime> China Seizes Banned E-Waste

["Soenke Zehle" <soenke.zehle@web.de>]

Remember the 1991 memo by Larry Summers, leaked to Greenpeace, on how the
so-called third world is - relatively speaking - 'underpolluted', which is
why it would make sense to spread the pain just a bit more evenly? Well,
here we go...

Soenke

[via ICRT]

Chinese Customs Seizes 'Electronic Garbage'  
(http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/200209/12/eng20020912_103066.shtml)
see also:

Official: China Seizes Banned Waste  
Wed Sep 18, 3:39 AM ET

BEIJING (AP) - Chinese customs officials seized 450 tons of junked
computer parts and other electronic waste shipped illegally from the
United States, an official said Wednesday.

The disclosure added to evidence that China's trade in imported computer
waste meant for recycling is thriving despite a crackdown launched in May
after reports of health dangers from unsafe handling.

The 22 shipping containers full of electronic garbage were seized this
month in the port of Wenzhou in China's southeast, said a customs official
there.

The waste included computer monitors, keyboards, photocopy machines and
television sets, said the official, who would give only his surname, Lin.

He wouldn't identify the companies involved or the American port where the
shipment originated. He said the case is still under investigation.

Small Chinese companies, many of them in the southeast near Hong Kong,
tear apart derelict computers and other electronic items to recover gold
and other materials.

Most workers have no protection from toxic fumes released by melting down
parts.

"Foreign exporters usually throw electronic garbage to our country by all
means for ill purposes," Lin said.

China launched its crackdown after environmentalists earlier this year
called attention to health problems in the town of Guiyu, a recycling
center near Hong Kong.

Guiyu residents told an Associated Press reporter who visited the town
that children there suffered medical problems including breathing
ailments, and that there had been a surge in leukemia cases.






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