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Contaminated French warship to leave for Gujarat yard shortly

Vaiju Naravane

Decommissioned Clemenceau is laden with highly toxic asbestos

Paris: The highly contaminated French aircraft carrier, Clemenceau, will shortly leave the southwestern port of Toulon to be dismantled at the ship-breaking yards at Alang in Gujarat, the Defence Ministry confirmed here.

The decommissioned warship is laden with asbestos, a highly toxic substance which, in principle, should not be exported since France is a signatory to the 1972 Basel Convention on Toxic Waste. The export of such waste is banned.

The announcement led to protests from environmental activists, who accuse the French government of wishing to rid itself of a polluted hot potato. Late Friday several dozen members of Greenpeace entered the premises of the Indian embassy to protest against the French government's decision and the Indian government's continued silence on the subject. They handed over a cardboard model of the Clemenceau to Deputy Chief of MissionK.V. Bhagirath. The Indian mission has since contacted the French authorities and also informed New Delhi of the situation.

"Promise not fulfilled"

Martin Besieux, who heads Greenpeace's department monitoring ship-breaking activities, told The Hindu in a telephonic interview: "The French government has now confirmed that there is still asbestos on board. But they have no idea exactly how much there is and where it is located. Initial estimates indicated there were 220 tonnes of the substance. The government had promised it would decontaminate 90 per cent of the ship, leaving the estimated ten per cent that is within the structure. It now appears that only 70 tonnes has been removed. That is far short of the 90 per cent promised. The government is clearly lying about the figures."

According to the government, 115 tonnes of the ship's asbestos-laden insulation has already been removed in Toulon and there are only several dozen tonnes of asbestos left.

The ship, which was bought for its steel (estimated at 8 million euros) by a subsidiary of the German industrial giant, Thyssen-Krup, is to be dismantled at Alang. But the shipyards there do not have the equipment to either safely remove toxic wastes or provide adequate protection to workers.

Mickael Goavec, a journalist with French television's Channel 3 in Toulon, told The Hindu that the Defence Ministry had issued a series of contradictory figures. "Christian Piotre, deputy head of Cabinet to Defence Minister, Mrs. Michele Alliot-Marie, has estimated that the ship has 220 tonnes of asbestos. In the same letter signed by him the government guarantees that 90 per cent of the substance will be removed. But then the Maritime Prefect of Brest in Brittany spoke of 250 tonnes. And now the Defence Ministry spokesman Jean-Francois Bureau tells us that figures are irrelevant and that the French government has removed as much asbestos as is possible."

The French government claims that if it were to undertake 90 per cent decontamination, certain segments of the ship would have to be removed, making sea transport extremely dangerous. But environmental activists say asbestos is part of the flooring, which can easily be removed without causing the structure to collapse.

Cheaper option

Documents obtained by The Hindu indicate that the government had received two price quotations from Technopure, which carried out partial decontamination. One quotation was for 3 million euros, while the second one was for 6 million euros. The government retained the cheaper option. This clearly indicates that far more could have been done and that economics too has played a role in how much asbestos has been removed.

Environmental NGOs have decided to take further legal action to try to stop the transfer of the Clemenceau. Two groups, Ban Asbestos and the National Association for the Defense of Asbestos Victims or ANDEVA, had talks on Friday with the office of the Defence Minister Michele Alliot-Marie.

"We disagreed and due to that we will pursue legal action," Annie Thebaud-Mony, a spokeswoman for Ban Asbestos, said, adding "between 140 and 180 tonnes" of asbestos remains on the ship.

The Clemenceau will leave for a shipbuilder in India "in the next few days," said Mr. Jean-Francois Bureau. In order to tow the mothballed ship to India it could not be totally dismantled in France.

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