Written by:
Laurie Kazan Allen
Published by:
The International Ban Asbestos Secretariat
Asia Monitor Resource Center
The Asian Network for the Rights of Occupational Accident Victims
The Building and Woodworkers International
Corporate Accountability Desk – The Other Media, India
Association for the Rights of Industrial Accident Victims
Hong Kong Confederation of Trade Unions
Japan Association of Mesothelioma and Asbestos-Related Disease Victims
and their Families
Ban Asbestos Network Japan
Ban Asbestos Network Korea
Design and Editing: David Allen
Photographs: Yeyong Choi, Sugio Furuya, Fernanda Giannasi,
Heinz Kropiunik, Noor Jehan, Dave Hodgkin, Prof. Naomi Hisanaga,
Trevor Sun, Nguyen Dinh Kien
Cartoons: Mike Italiaander
Printer: Justasec Print Services Ltd. London HA8 7DB, England– printed on ECF paper from sustainable forests
For further information about this publication, please contact:
Laurie Kazan-Allen, Coordinator, IBAS
email: laurie@lkaz.demon.co.uk© IBAS – London, November 2009.

The International Ban Asbestos Secretariat (IBAS) was established in 1999; it is an independent nongovernmental organization which has two objectives: a worldwide ban on asbestos and justice for all asbestos
victims. IBAS monitors, analyzes and disseminates news received from the ever-expanding network ofindividuals and groups involved in the international movement against asbestos, as well as information fromlegal, medical and industry sources. IBAS produces written material and organizes conferences to raise theprofile of asbestos issues. The work of IBAS is coordinated by Laurie Kazan-Allen; more information is available on thewebsite: http://www.ibasecretariat.org/

IBAS Report

Asian Asbestos Conference 2009
Hong Kong
April 26-27, 2009

Contents
Preface1

Introduction

2

Preparatory Meeting4

Welcome Session

5

Plenary Session 1: Asia’s Asbestos Time Bomb

6

Plenary Session 2: Tackling the Hazardous Aftermath of Asia’s Asbestos Consumption

8

Workshop 1: The Basic Facts about Asbestos

12

Workshop 2: Medical Session

15

Break-out Session 1: Potential Asian Claims on U.S. Asbestos Bankruptcy Trusts

17

Break-out Session 2: Building the Ban Asbestos Network

18

Workshop 3: Practical Considerations for Minimizing the Asbestos Hazard

19

Plenary Session 3: Country Reports

23

Plenary Session 4: Meeting the Needs of Asbestos Victims

27

Workshop 4: International Transfer of Asbestos Industry to Asian Locations

30

Workshop 5: Shipyards, Ship-breaking Industry and Railways

33

Plenary Session 5: Building the Global Ban Asbestos Network

35

Plenary Session 6: Going Forward: Consolidation and Closing Session

39

Concluding Thoughts

40

Postscript

42

Appendix A: Hong Kong Declaration towards a Complete Ban on all forms of Asbestos

44

Endnotes and References46

Preface
Asia has long needed a coordinated approach to the problem ofwidespread asbestos use. While some countries in the region, such as
Japan and Korea, have already instituted asbestos bans, others continue tomanufacture and use asbestos products; in particular, India and China
remain heavy users.
China’s Minister of Health Chen Zhu recently warned decision-makers in
Beijing that “Work-related disease has still not been controlled effectively.”[1] According to a report in the China Daily on April 25, 2009:“the Minister revealed that some illnesses, such as pneumoconiosis– the so-called black lung disease that affects many miners – arebecoming more prevalent. And he said more respiratory diseases arebeing diagnosed in younger people than before.
The country’s 250 million migrant workers, who mostly work insmall- and medium-sized enterprises, often have not signed contracts,
move frequently and are at high risk of contracting an occupational
disease.”
Advising experts and government officials that the incidence of occupational disease may be grossly underreported, Minister Zhu predicted that“the number of new cases of work-related illnesses will keep climbing”[2]. From the article, it appeared that the Minister’s comments about
pneumoconiosis related to injured miners, nevertheless, the journalist pointed out that “Pneumoconiosis is caused by long exposure to mineral or
metallic dust and emergent poisoning at work.” Asbestosis, a signature disease contracted by workers who mine, process or handle asbestos, is aform of pneumoconiosis. As China is the world’s biggest user of asbestos
and second biggest producer, there can be little doubt that the incidence ofasbestosis, along with other types of pneumoconiosis, will rise there.
The Minister’s statements taken in combination with the fact that the
Chinese Government banned the use of asbestos in automotive friction materials (2003) and in building products for the construction of the 2008
Beijing Olympics indicate that not only is there a high level of official concern over asbestos but also that action is being taken to protect the population from hazardous exposures. The timing of Minister Chen Zhu’scomments on the eve of the Asian Asbestos Conference 2009 – the first“grass-roots” asbestos conference in China – was indeed serendipitous.

1

Introduction
The first decade of the twenty-first century has seen a remarkable transition in the public perception of asbestos.
Once revered as “the world’s most wonderful mineral” asbestos is now widely regarded as a global curse – “killer
dust” [3]. This change of view owes much to the commitment and efforts of asbestos victims, public health campaigners and labor activists who have worked resolutely to
expose the silent epidemic of asbestos-related diseases
that has blighted so many lives. Although victims’ groups
had campaigned on local asbestos problems since the1980s, the first steps towards coordinated international action were not taken until the mid-1990s. With increasing
communication, the opportunities offered by the internet
and the establishment of a body to monitor developments– the International Ban Asbestos Secretariat – the virtual
ban asbestos citizen’s movement expanded rapidly. The
movement came of age with the holding of the world’s
first victim-oriented asbestos conference: the Global Asbestos Congress 2000 (GAC 2000). The congress was a concrete demonstration of the latent power of the growing
network of individuals and groups that supported a universal asbestos ban and justice for the injured. In many ways,
it was the acorn from which so much has grown.
It is interesting to note that amongst the 100 foreign delegates who travelled to Osasco, São Paulo to attend GAC
2000 were four from Japan and one each from Korea, andIndia [4]. Within four years, Asian ban asbestos mobilization had mushroomed, and as a result the second Global Asbestos Congress, which was held in Tokyo in 2004,
attracted 800 delegates from 40 countries [5]. Two years
later, the first asbestos conference to focus specifically on
the Asian region – the Asian Asbestos Conference 2006 –brought together in Bangkok 300 delegates from Asia,
Africa, Europe, Australia and North America [6]. Capitalizing on the momentum achieved by these earlier events, in
April this year nearly 200 delegates from 24 countries
traveled to Hong Kong to attend the event which is the subject of this report (AAC 2009). The number of people involved in the above conferences and the diversity of
sectors and groups they represented clearly indicate thatwhat was once considered a radical fringe movement has
most definitely entered the mainstream.
While ban asbestos activists are now invited to take part in
Parliamentary panels, consult on research protocols andcontribute to government decision making, once all-powerful asbestos industry representatives have been cast adriftby former supporters and beneficiaries who no longer
wish to be associated with the tainted products they purvey. The outdated and compromised research that asbestos
stakeholders relied on has, time and again, been revealed
as biased and inaccurate. Indeed, the consensus on asbestos among all major international agencies is in total dis-2

agreement with an industry still maintaining that asbestos
can be used safely under “controlled conditions.” The
World Health Organization, the International Labor Organization, the International Agency for Research on Cancer,
the Collegium Ramazzini, the World Bank, the United Nations, the International Commission on Occupational
Health, the International Trade Union Confederation, theWorld Bank and the World Trade Organization concur that
all types of asbestos are dangerous, there is no such thingas safe use and the best way to protect humanity from hazardous exposures is to ban asbestos. The pronouncementsof the asbestos lobby are now perceived to be as credibleas those from the flat-earth society, another group locatedat the outer limits of the lunatic fringe.
The concept of AAC 2009 [7] was refined during consultation over a period of nearly two years. Careful consideration was given to the choice of venue and timing of theevent. Recognizing that China is the world’s most prolificuser of asbestos, and that China had been under-represented at previous meetings, it was decided to hold the conference in Hong Kong. There is little doubt that theproximity of the venue encouraged many key personnel
from mainland China to attend, as did large contingentsfrom India, Japan, Korea and Indonesia together with delegates from other Asian countries, global ban asbestos
campaigners, medical experts, legal professionals, tradeunionists, technicians and academics. There was provision
for simultaneous translation into Mandarin, Cantonese,
Korean, Japanese and English to facilitate the needs of thedifferent national delegations. To emphasize the ongoingasbestos health risks faced by millions of workers in Asia,
the date of the conference was set to coincide with the runup to International Workers’ Memorial Day, when there
was a demonstration of solidarity by conference delegates.
Indeed, the activities on that day, which included two wellattended and colorful rallies in central Hong Kong, standas testament to the growing strength of the ban asbestos
movement in Asia.

Asbestos Consumption 2005-2007
Year

China
(tonnes)Asia(tonnes)Global(tonnes)

Asia % China %of Global of Global

2007 629,099 1,123,013 2,079,590
2006 531,190 1,283,979 2,214,068
2005 514,614 1,201,625 2,148,162

54%
58%
56%

30%
24%
24%

Total 1,674,903 3,608,617 6,441,820

N/A

N/A

_______________
This data has been sourced from the United States Geological
Survey; http://minerals.usgs.gov/minerals/pubs/commodity/asbestos/Throughout this report, discrepancies in asbestos consumption andproduction data are common; these differences reflect the continuing
vagueness of official sources when it comes to reporting on asbestos.

In its emphasis on grass-roots concerns and broad participation, AAC 2009 was the first international asbestos conference of its kind to be held in China.* The agenda, which
was developed through a participatory process, gave priority to key issues as identified by asbestos victims’ groups,
regional bodies, NGOs and labor federations during numerous meetings, skype conference calls and through the exchange of hundreds of emails. As the aim of theconference organizers – the Asia Monitor Resource Center(AMRC), the International Ban Asbestos Secretariat(IBAS), the Hong Kong Confederation of Trade Unions
and the Association for the Rights of Industrial Accident
Victims – was to strengthen the grass-roots ban asbestos
movement in Asia, discussion time was regarded as a key
agenda priority. To encourage interaction and maximize delegates’ participation, informal workshops, break-outgroups and discussion sessions complimented the morestructured plenary sessions. Other “happenings” which
took place from April 25-28, including a photographic exhibition, video screenings, trips to examine asbestos contamination of local domestic buildings, media interviews
and a press conference, helped realize the organizers’ vision of a multidimensional event.

It is highly significant that during the conference, representatives from international agencies tasked with protecting occupational and public health – the International
Labor Organization, the World Health Organization andthe International Commission on Occupational Health –reiterated calls previously made by their organizations in
support of a global asbestos ban; what is more, they expressed willingness to work closely with other groups, including victims’ organizations, on the elimination ofasbestos-related disease. On a regional level, the establishment of the Asian Ban Asbestos Network (A-BAN) at
AAC 2009 was, according to the Hong Kong Declaration(Appendix A), “a landmark in the Asian campaign to obtain justice for the asbestos-injured and to implement a regional asbestos ban.”
The report which follows is an attempt to disseminate theimportant information presented in Hong Kong and convey something of the atmosphere in which the discussions
took place.
* Previous meetings had been selective, open only to invited academics
and industry personnel.

3Preparatory Meeting

On April 25, in advance of the main conference, a threehour meeting was held for grass-roots delegates. There
was a real buzz as the room filled up with veteran campaigners and people new to the ban asbestos network. As individuals gave a brief introduction of their backgroundand expertise, it became clear that despite a lack of asbestos knowledge, most of the newcomers had a wealth of experience in related issues such as occupational health andsafety, workers’ rights, environmental and community campaigning.
To bring them up to speed, it had been arranged that experienced Asian campaigners would be on hand to review thedevelopment of ban asbestos activism in Asia and key issues that would need to be addressed during the conference. The principal speaker was Sugio Furuya from the
Ban Asbestos Network, Japan. He described how working
nationally, bilaterally, regionally and internationally, theban asbestos movement in Asia had developed.
National victims’ initiatives on asbestos had included theestablishment of the Japan Association of Mesothelioma
and Asbestos-Related Disease Victims and their Families(2004), Indian asbestos victims’ groups (2004), the Korean
National Network of Asbestos Victims and their Families(2009) and community support for asbestos victims in thePhilippines, Hong Kong and Taiwan.
Making common cause with NGOs such as IBAS, global
labor federations, national trade unions and regional cam-4

paigning groups like AMRC and ANROAV had resulted
in a number of joint initiatives which had raised publicawareness of asbestos issues: GAC 2000 (Brazil), GAC
2004 (Japan), AAC 2006 (Thailand), Yokohoma International Asbestos Conference 2007 (Japan), Asbestos International Conference and satellite events 2008 (Korea).
High-profile policy papers and resolutions on the asbestos
menace issued since 2006 by international agencies – theInternational Labor Organization, the World Health Organization and the International Social Security Association –had made a major contribution to national asbestos debates and reinforced the positions adopted by grass-rootsgroups following multilateral workshops and meetings in
Bangladesh (2006), Korea (2007), Indonesia (2008) andTaiwan (2009).
Research projects spearheaded by Japanese and Korean
victims’ groups on contamination posed by asbestos textile and mining operations in Indonesia and Taiwan had
identified occupational and public health risks and stimulated outrage amongst local people at the invasion of theircommunities by such hazardous technology.
Following this presentation, there was a lively exchangeof ideas on how best to progress the ban asbestos campaign throughout Asia, and how to maximize the opportunities offered by the conference due to formallycommence the next day.

Outline Conference Agenda

April 26
09:00-10:10
10:10-11:10
11:30-13:45
14:45-16:45
14:45-16:45
14:45-16:45
17:00-19:00
17:00-19:00

Welcome Session
Plenary Session 1
Plenary Session 2
Workshop 1
Workshop 2
Break-out Session 1
Break-out Session 2
Workshop 3

Asia’s Asbestos Time Bomb
Tackling the Aftermath of Asia’s Asbestos Consumption
The Basic Facts about Asbestos
Medical Session
Potential Asian Claims on U.S. Asbestos Bankruptcy Trusts
Building the Asian Ban Asbestos Network
Practical Considerations for Minimizing the Asbestos Hazard

April 27
09:00-11:15
11:30-13:30
14:30-16:00
14:30-16:00
16:00-18:00
18:00-19:00

Plenary Session 3
Plenary Session 4
Workshop 4
Workshop 5
Plenary Session 5
Plenary Session 6Country Reports
Meeting the Needs of Asbestos Victims
International Transfer of Asbestos Industry to Asian locations
Shipyards, Ship-breaking Industry and Railways
Building the Global Ban Asbestos Network
Going Forward: Consolidation and Closing Session

Welcome Session
Moderator: Omana George

During this session, representatives of bodies central tothe organization of the conference welcomed delegatesand signposted key focal points for coming sessions.
Lee Cheuk-yan from the Hong Kong Confederation ofTrade Unions emphasized the need for local groups to continue pressure on Hong Kong authorities to prohibit theuse of chrysotile asbestos, crocidolite and amosite asbestos having already been banned. Such a ban could prevent
Hong Kong from becoming a dumping ground for asbestos unwanted in countries where bans had been enacted.
The adoption of a comprehensive asbestos ban in Hong
Kong would undoubtedly, he believed, have an impact on
Chinese asbestos regulations.

Mrs. Sito (center) with Chan Kam-hong and Elsie
Fung of ARIAV
voice of the victims remained an essential component for
any campaign to ban asbestos; their views were expressedby Mrs. Sito, the wife of a Hong Kong mechanic and shipbuilder who had been incapacitated by his asbestos-related illness. Mrs. Sito called for a total asbestos ban inHong Kong. A minute of silence was observed to pay tribute to the victims.
Key points raised by speakers from international bodies included the:Opening speaker Lee Cheuk-yan
The mobilization of the grass-roots ban asbestos movement in Asia was a prerequisite for progressing the regional campaign according to Sanjiv Pandita from the AMRC.
To effectively combat industry propaganda, a partnershipwith other stakeholders, including asbestos victims
groups, trade unions, NGOs and international agencies,
and a coordinated strategic approach were needed, Mr. Pandita said.
Chan Kam-hong from the Association for the Rights of Industrial Accident Victims (ARIAV) paid tribute to the commitment and effectiveness of campaigning done in Hong
Kong by pneumoconiosis and asbestos victims; pressure
from victims had brought about improvements in compensation, medical treatment and rehabilitation services. TheŶ information vacuum in Asian countries about theabestos hazard and the incidence of asbestos-relateddiseases;Ŷ need for a proactive approach to Asia’s increasing useof asbestos;Ŷ elevated incidence of asbestos-related disease
amongst construction workers;Ŷ potential for future collaboration between grass-rootsgroups and other organizations;Ŷ importance of networking among institutional bodies
from different domains;Ŷ need to work together on the development anddissemination of toolkits needed for the implementation of national asbestos action programs;
Ŷ need for a regional framework for occupational healthand safety which would include work on the Asianasbestos initiative.

5Plenary Session 1

Asia's Asbestos Time Bomb
Moderator: Elizabeth TangIn the presentation The Global Asbestos Panorama 2009,
IBAS Coordinator Laurie Kazan-Allen described the advances made in recent years; these included national asbestos bans in Asia, Latin America and Africa, increasing
input by asbestos victims’ groups and campaigners into national asbestos debates, a heightened public awareness ofasbestos issues in many countries, the birth of ban asbestos campaigns in India, Indonesia and the Philippines andan increased willingness of campaigners from different sectors of civil society to collaborate in joint initiatives. Central to the success of global efforts was the work of victims
and their loved ones. Paying tribute to British campaigner
Nancy Tait, “the first person to turn asbestos anger into activism” [8], the speaker commented:“Born into a typical English family in a London suburb in the 1920s, there was not the slightest chancethat Nancy would become a political campaigner –that she did so is entirely due to the asbestos tragedy
which befell her family. In 1967, Nancy’s husband
Bill became ill; a year later he died of the asbestos cancer, mesothelioma.”
Nancy’s anger at the tragedy which had torn her family
apart fueled her pioneering efforts to force negligent corporations and government bodies to acknowledge the damage
done by Britain’s use of asbestos.
As the global ban asbestos movement had gone fromstrength to strength, industry stakeholders had capitalizedon the seemingly limitless funds at their disposal to corrupt the media, curry favor with governments, pervert thescientific process, attack their opponents, manipulate national asbestos debates and exert immense pressure on international agencies. That the orchestrated global asbestos
lobby was showing signs of terminal decline was due
largely to the perseverance, creative campaigns and collaborative efforts being made by grass-roots activists.
The next speaker, Professor Ken Takahashi from the University of Occupational and Environmental Health, Japan,
addressed the subject: Asbestos Diseases – A Global Ecological Perspective. An analysis of asbestos mortality data re-

It should not be necessary for each country toexperience an asbestos epidemic before action
was taken
vealed that while deaths were increasing in Latin America,
the death rate was flattening or decreasing in industrialized nations in Europe and North America. Unfortunately,
the fact that the majority of asbestos-consuming countries

6

Professor Ken Takahashi
lacked mortality data was used by some governments tobolster arguments for the continued use of asbestos. It
should not, the speaker said, be necessary for each country to experience an asbestos epidemic before action was
taken: “Such a notion represents a failure of the scientificcommunity, along with the international organizations andNGOs, to provide convincing arguments to support theelimination of use.”
The situation in Asia was of particular concern due to:Ŷ a dearth of data on disease incidence;Ŷ little government engagement with asbestos-related
problems; only two out of 32 (6%) Asian countries
had ratified ILO Asbestos Convention 162; only six
out of 44 (14%) Asian countries had banned asbestos[9];
Ŷ increasing Asian asbestos usage – in 1985, Asia
accounted for 19% of global consumption; by 2000,
it accounted for 47%.
To counteract the lack of statistical evidence, scientists
had developed a “per capita asbestos use indicator,” whichallowed experts to correlate a country’s use/dependence
on asbestos with future mortality; this method, when usedin conjunction with other measures, could produce reliable estimates of disease levels in most Asian countries[10]. Such estimates could be used to press for the adoption of better national policies on asbestos.
The final speaker in this session was Professor Xiaorong
Wang [11] who addressed the topic: The Current Situation of Asbestos-related Problems in China. Professor
Wang expressed surprise that, as one of the world’s top
producers, importers and users of asbestos [12], the repor-ted incidence of asbestos-related diseases in China was solow. More than 100,000 people routinely experienced occupational asbestos exposures [13]. The worst exposures had
occurred in small mines and factories in rural areas whichwere more poorly regulated than larger production facilities in urban areas. The Chinese government had banned
the use of amosite and crocidolite and had set standards
for maximum asbestos dust concentrations in workplaces.
Unfortunately these standards, which were often unenforced, were last updated in 2002. The speaker said that
“In the past, dust concentrations in some factories andmines were 100 times higher than the current standard.”

were in the northwest of the country. Graphs illustratingworld asbestos production showed by Professor Wang indicated that by 2001 China had usurped Canada as theworld’s second biggest asbestos producer (after Russia)[14].

China had in excess of 90 million tons of chrysotile asbestos reserves distributed in 15 provinces many of which“asbestos workers were more than 3 times more
likely to develop cancer as compared to thecontrol group.”

The speaker discussed research concerning workers at
chrysotile-using factories. All the factories had poor working conditions, high levels of exposure and low standardsof health and safety; asbestos dust levels far exceeded allowable concentrations. People in the neighboring communities were also exposed to high levels of asbestos

liberated by the manufacturing processes. The cohort consisted of 515 male workers who were followed for 25
years. There was an increased risk of all cancers amongst
cohort members; indeed, “asbestos workers were morethan 3 times more likely to develop cancer as compared tothe control group.” There was a high risk of lung cancer,
especially for those people who worked in the textile andraw materials departments; smoking increased the likelihood of contracting lung cancer. This cohort was being
followed up and it was hoped that this research would be
used as evidence of the need to implement more rigorous
controls on the use of asbestos in order to protect workers’
health.

Professor Xiaorong Wang

Top Asbestos-Consuming Countries
Country

Tonnes
(2006)

Tonnes(2007)

Signatory to
ILO Asbestos
Convention

GlobalRanking(2006/2007)

China
RussiaIndia
Kazakhstan
BrazilThailandUkraineUzbekistan
VietnamIndonesia
Zimbabwe
Kyrgyzstan

531,190
292,541
272,856
151,231
143,123
140,861
124,130
63,24660,65740,542
34,40924,056

626,099
280,019
302,139
108,951
93,78086,52585,60286,48864,42946,18757,32920,862

No
Yes
No
No
Yes
No
No
No
No
No
Yes
No

1/1
2/3
3/2
4/4
5/5
6/6
7/8
8/7
9/9
10/11
11/10
12/12

1,879,659

1,858,410

Total

Source: United States Geological Survey.

7

Plenary Session 2

Tackling the Hazardous Aftermath of Asia’s Asbestos Consumption
Moderator: Madhumita Dutta

Introducing the panel of speakers, Madhumita Dutta said
that, having defined the problems caused by the use of asbestos worldwide, it was essential that solutions be foundfor protecting humanity and the environment from contamination. In the presentation The ILO Campaign to End Asbestos-Related Diseases, Tsuyoshi Kawakami [15]delineated the asbestos policy of the International Labor Organization (ILO), citing ILO Asbestos Convention 1986
and Asbestos Resolution 2006. The speaker listed five key
action areas which made up the ILO’s campaign to eliminate asbestos-related disease:Ŷ the promotion of asbestos awareness amongst national
populations and governments; research had revealed
that government officials often had a low level ofknowledge about the asbestos hazard;
Ŷ diagnostic training and support for physicians on thefront line; the lack of medical expertise in diagnosing
asbestos-related diseases fed into government policy
when few cases of asbestos-related disease wereidentified;Ŷ the provision of information, the development offinancial programs and the promotion of sustainable
technologies to encourage the replacement of asbestos
manufacturing by a safer production system;Ŷ technical assistance for small companies to help themmake the transition to a safer technology;
Ŷ the establishment and implementation of national
asbestos programs.

cupational Cancer Convention 1974 (No. 139).
Currently, 125 million people were being exposed to asbestos worldwide, 60% of them in the Asia-Pacific region.
More than 90,000 workers died every year from asbestosrelated diseases. Asbestos, the world’s worst occupational
carcinogen, accounted for 54% of all deaths from occupational cancer. In light of these facts and increasing asbestos consumption in Asia, the World Health Organization(WHO) was, said Hisashi Ogawa, seriously concerned[16]. The speaker detailed the collaborative program on asbestos being implemented by the WHO in conjunction
with the ILO following agreement reached at the 13th Session of the ILO/WHO Joint Committee on Occupational
Health (2003) that special efforts would be taken to eliminate asbestos-related diseases. In his presentation, Towards the Elimination of Asbestos-related Diseases:
WHO Approach, Ogawa reiterated the WHO’s asbestos
policy:Ŷ all types of asbestos caused asbestosis, mesothelioma
and lung cancer;

Ŷ no safe threshold level of exposure had been
identified;Ŷ safer substitutes existed;Ŷ exposure of workers and other users of asbestos-containing products was extremely difficult to control;

Ŷ asbestos abatement was very costly and hard to be
carried out in a completely safe way.
As well as working with ILO colleagues, the WHO had
supported initiatives by other stakeholders such as the Asian Asbestos Initiative organized by the University of Occupational and Environmental Health, Japan, a WHO
collaborating center, the Asian Asbestos Conference 2006
(Bangkok) and, of course, AAC 2009. A new publication
which described recommended procedures for dealing
with asbestos in post-disaster emergencies illustrated thesustained and multifaceted approach of the WHO asbestos
campaign [17].

Tsuyoshi Kawakami (center) with Hisashi Ogawa
and Mahdumita Dutta
Recent ILO activities on asbestos had included: the organization’s participation in national asbestos workshops in Vietnam (2008), Thailand (2007 & 2008), medical training
courses and dialogue with member states to encouragethem to adopt Asbestos Convention 1986 (No. 162) and Oc-

8

As in other parts of the world, in Asia the fight against asbestos is being spearheaded by those most affected: thevictims. In his presentation, Sugio Furuya, from the Ban
Asbestos Network Japan (BANJAN) and the Japan Occupational Safety and Health Resource Center, addressed thesubject of: Asbestos Victims’ Campaigns in Asia. Although Japanese asbestos consumption decreased following the adoption of a national ban, usage was increasing in
China, Thailand, India and other Asian countries. Asian
manufacturers exploited national loopholes to transfer asbestos textile operations from Japan to Korea in the 1970s

Within 6 months of GAC 2004, the Japanese public andmedia were shocked by public disclosures of scores of occupational and neighborhood asbestos deaths; the public
impact of this news became known as the “Kubota
Shock.” Despite the publicity which surrounded these revelations, it was left to the victims and to BANJAN to continue the campaign to obtain justice for all those affected,
including the payment of financial compensation and all
medical expenses, and the adoption of preventative measures.
The Japanese experience showed the importance of adopting a precautionary approach to asbestos, rather than waiting for a national epidemic to emerge. Among the lessons
learned in Japan were that:

Sugio Furuya

Ŷ an asbestos ban was the first step in tackling the wideand afterwards from Korea to Indonesia.

ranging aspects of national asbestos legacies.

Ŷ the role of asbestos victims and their families was
During the next 40 years, mortality from malignant pleural
mesothelioma amongst Japanese males could exceed
103,000. These asbestos-related deaths would occur as aresult of six different types of exposure.
Type of Exposure

At-Risk Groups

direct occupational

contracted workers and the selfemployed
contracted workers and the selfemployed
relatives of exposed workers
residents living near asbestos
plants, mines, etc.
members of the public
occupying or using
contaminated buildings
everyoneindirect occupationaldomesticneighborhood
environmental

untraceable

Epidemiologists had not yet begun to calculate the effectsof Japanese asbestos consumption when the mobilizationof Japanese asbestos victims began; in 1987, BANJAN
was formed by a coalition of trade unions, citizens’
groups, OSH campaigners and interested individuals.
Amongst BANJAN’s main objectives were: identifying
and empowering asbestos victims and their families andlobbying for changes in government policies.
In 2002, BANJAN began efforts to bring together regional
victims groups and in 2004 a nationwide umbrella group –the Japan Association of Asbestos-Related Diseases Victims and their Families – was formed. This national victims’ group played a key role in organizing the Global
Asbestos Congress 2004 (GAC 2004) which attracted 800
participants, including 120 overseas delegates from 40
countries, to the three-day event in Tokyo.

paramount; indeed, asbestos mobilization began withthe efforts of concerned individuals – such as the victims.
Ŷ coordinating the lobbying and campaigning efforts ofcivil society was crucial to maximizing effectiveness.
Ŷ regional and global cooperation at various levels andacross subject disciplines was strongly recommended.
Ŷ good relations with journalists helped to keep the asbestos issue on the political agenda; the media was
key to getting the message across.
Asian asbestos mobilization continued with efforts madein Korea by victims in Busan, a town which was home to
many asbestos textile factories. In 2006, a Busan association of asbestos victims was set up which organized highprofile protests, an international asbestos symposium, apublic hearing in the National Diet Library and an ongoing dialogue between Korean and Japanese victims’groups. In 2008, the Korean Network to Ban Asbestos(BANKO) was formed and this year (2009) the Korean
National Network of Asbestos Victims was launched.
Since 2006, new asbestos victims’ groups had been set up
in India, the Philippines, Hong Kong and Taiwan. On a regional level, the Asia Network for the Rights of Occupational Accident Victims and the Asia Monitor Resource
Center had increased their campaigning on asbestos. Morecould be achieved by activists working together on common issues such as: lobbying for a regional ban, registering at-risk individuals, monitoring occupational andpublic health, pressing for improved medical treatment
and financial support, managing asbestos in the environment and preventing the transfer of hazardous technologies to developing countries.
Although international trade unions and properly constituted national unions were, said speaker Fiona Murie of
the Building and Woodworkers International (BWI) [18].
“overwhelmingly in favor of a worldwide asbestos ban,”9Plenary Session 2
since 2006 an industry-backed front group – the International Trade Unions’ Alliance for ‘Chrysotile’ – had been
aggressively promoting pro-asbestos propaganda, pressurizing international agencies and national governments todelay action on asbestos and attacking ban asbestos campaigners. The Russian-based pro-chrysotile “movement”

since 2006 an industry backed front group …
had been aggressively promoting pro-asbestos
propaganda …
was made up of personnel from asbestos mining and cement manufacturing industries; corporate munificence enabled industry stooges to run the “No Chrysotile Ban”
website, produce glossy multilingual literature and senddelegates around the world on lobbying junkets.
In her presentation, Global Mobilization of Trade Union
Action on Asbestos, Ms. Murie contrasted the scams perpetrated by these imitation trade unionists with the BWI campaign to protect human beings from the asbestos hazard.
The main BWI arguments for banning all types of asbestos, including chrysotile (white) asbestos, were the following:Ŷ all types of asbestos had been classified by theInternational Agency for Research into Cancer(IARC) as Group 1 carcinogens;Ŷ safer substitutes were available and had been
positively evaluated by the WHO and IARC;Ŷ there was no safe threshold of exposure, industry’s“controlled use” policy was a myth especially in theconstruction industry in developing countries;Ŷ the ILO policy was clarified by a 2006 Resolution
adopted by the 95th Session of the International
Labour Conference which called for an end to the useof chrysotile [19]; the BWI, working in collaboration
with other union activists, was instrumental ingetting this resolution adopted.
The BWI continued to work with its affiliates and stakeholders from other sectors of civil society, such as NGOs,
asbestos victims groups, government agencies and international bodies. Concluding her talk, the speaker urged conference delegates to coordinate efforts to push forgovernment action, help identify key players and decision
makers in national asbestos debates, develop country andsector specific campaign strategies and make use of regional networks to progress BWI goals.
In recognition of the fact that Australia had the highest incidence of asbestos cancer in the world, the Government
agreed to develop a national research strategy under the
auspices of a new body: the National Centre for AsbestosRelated Diseases (NCARD) [20]. Professor Bruce Robinson, NCARD’s Director, began his presentation by describing the operations of this virtual organization, hosted in
Perth by the University of Western Australia. NCARD pro-

10

Professor Bruce Robinson
moted a coordinated and collaborative asbestos cancer research program aimed at the development of newtreatment protocols and the discovery of cures; it also lobbied the government and other stakeholders for additional
funding. NCARD’s results had been impressive with substantial progress in the development of early diagnosis
methods, new treatment protocols involving immunotherapy, chemotherapy, gene therapy and new surgical approaches.
The professor used the opportunity of his presentation in
Hong Kong to extend NCARD’s remit beyond Australia’s
shores when he launched: A New Australia–Asia Asbestos
Research Cooperative. Such a scheme was urgently
needed due to the high levels of asbestos consumption in
Asia, the lack of controls and the popularity of cigarette

In the coming decades, Professor Robinson said,
between one and two million people would die
from asbestos-induced cancer in Asia.
smoking. In the coming decades, Professor Robinson said,
between one and two million people could die from asbestos-induced cancer in Asia. It was important to conduct research on Asian asbestos issues for medical reasons, ongrounds of compassion and morality, and because it could
save a lot of money. Predictions for national asbestos compensation bills were horrific: US$200 bn in the UnitedStates, US$85 bn in Europe, US$8.5 bn in Australia.
There were no predictions for Asia.
The aims of the new cooperative were to:Ŷ keep researchers updated on current research andtreatment developments;

Ŷ provide training fellowships in asbestos-relateddisease research;Ŷ collaborate in science and medicine, i.e. epidemiology and clinical trials;

Ŷ support the environmental control of asbestos
exposures.

In Asia, a region which was plagued by shortages of medical equipment and training opportunities, participation in
the Australian program was an exciting prospect withmuch to offer: periodic updates on asbestos research andtreatment, lectures by asbestos experts, Australian training
fellowships for junior doctors or scientists to learn about research into occupational lung diseases (particularly asbestos diseases) and research collaboration to get hard data.
Without country specific data, it was extremely difficult toconvince policymakers of the need to ban asbestos; withthis data and with the support of experts, changing national policy might become a real possibility. Concluding his
presentation, the speaker encouraged AAC 2009 delegates
to take part in the new initiative and asked them to spreadnews about the cooperative to their colleagues. In an upcoming trip to Indonesia, the professor hoped to encourage participation from local doctors.
For decades, the producers and processors of asbestos
have conducted business on a global scale. Japanese asbestos companies owned plants in Korea and Indonesia andAmericanmanufacturers
soldasbestos-containing
products throughout Asia. Lawyer Steven Kazan’s presentation Transnational Claims: How U.S. Developments Affect Asian Asbestos Victims explored one consequence ofthe globalized market: the possibility for Asian asbestos
victims to bring successful claims against U.S. defendants[21]. Having dismissed as too uncertain options such as suing the U.S. Government under the Federal Tort Claims
Act, 28 U.S.C.A. Section 1346 or U.S. corporations underthe Alien Tort Claims Act, 28 U.S.C.A. Section 1350, thespeaker focused his remarks on the possibility of obtaining
compensation from one of the 25 bankruptcy trusts set up
as a result of Chapter 11 reorganizations. Although, the current assets of these trusts was $25,998,000,000, when theassets of the pending bankruptcies of Asarco, PCC,
Quigley, THAN and WR Grace were added to the pot, thetotal would exceed $33 billion [22]. Of the 25 operating
trusts, nine acknowledged liabilities from foreign sites
with Babcock & Wilcox’s 2,285 sites constituting 77% of
all the foreign sites listed. Eleven of the trusts acknowledged shipboard exposures with Babcock & Wilcox’s
8,022 ships accounting for 61% of the total (13,056) [23].
While the maximum value of a mesothelioma claim
between trusts varied from a low of $40,000 (HK Porter)
to a high of $1 million (Narco), the majority of trusts had
similar structures and processes for lodging claims. [Itshould be pointed out that the trusts generally pay only aproportion of the value of a mesothelioma claim; e.g. under the HK Porter Trust fund only 6.3% of the listed valueof a claim would be paid, whereas under the Owens Corning Trust 40% would be paid.]
By and large, the process of submitting a claim was “relatively easy and victim friendly,” although all submissions
must be supported by certified abstracts or translations into English. The speaker made it clear that the successful
submission of a claim could be accomplished by a nonlawyer and recommended that asbestos victims’ groups ortrade unions undertake this task on behalf of their members. To obtain compensation from a trust, claimants must:Ŷ show exposure to a company’s product at one of theirworksites;Ŷ state their occupation and the time period during
which they worked with the product;Ŷ specify their asbestos-related disease and name theirdependents;

Ŷ calculate their economic loss (optional).
The speaker invited delegates to attend an afternoon breakout session which would provide a detailed explanation of
how to submit claims to the U.S. trusts.

11

Workshop 1

The Basic Facts about Asbestos
Moderator: Apolinar Tolentino

While many AAC 2009 delegates had some knowledge ofasbestos issues, others were coming to the subject for the
first time. To deal with varying levels of knowledge, aglossary of terms and a handout (in Chinese and English)on the basic facts were distributed. In her opening remarks, Fiona Murie concentrated on the issue of asbestos
cement. Ninety percent of the asbestos being used today
went into the manufacture of asbestos-cement (AC) building products such as pipes, tiles, roofing materials, sheets
for partition walls and insulating materials. On building
sites and during maintenance, renovation and demolition
activities, AC materials were sawed, cut, broken, abradedand perforated throughout the working day; as a consequence, asbestos fibers were liberated and workers were
exposed to the hazards of contracting asbestos-related diseases.
There was a consensus that the best way to protect building workers from harmful exposures was to stop the use ofasbestos. There were alternative substances which could replace asbestos in the production of fiber cement: cellulose,
polyvinyl alcohol, p-aramids and polypropylene. With
some minor changes, the same production processes andequipment could be used for the manufacture of the asbestos-free cement as for AC. Although production costs werehigher, these costs did not take into account the downstream costs of using asbestos, such as worker protection,
medical care, welfare and social security benefits, payment of compensation, the high price of asbestos removal

or disposal of contaminated waste.
Until these contaminated products were eliminated frombuilding sites, measures – such as those specified in ILO
Convention 162 – should be put in place to protect workers’ safety. International agencies and global trade unions
agreed that special provisions should be made for asbestos-exposed workers which included: health surveillance
and registers of the exposed to facilitate early diagnosis,
access to medical care, advice, treatment, rehabilitation,
the provision of legal advice, social security benefits andcompensation awards and measures to ensure social
justice for victims. Securing these rights could best be
achieved by the adoption of a strategic campaign withdefined aims and action areas which was supported by acoalition of trade unions, victims’ groups and sympathetic
professionals; a discussion ensued about how best to further these aims [24].
Continuing the discussion of the risk to construction workers was Katsuyuki Iida from the Tokyo Occupational
Safety & Health Centre, whose presentation was: Dust
Prevention for Carpenters: Grass-roots Activity on aConstruction Site in Tokyo. Even though Japan banned
the use of asbestos, the potential for hazardous exposures
had continued, due to the presence of asbestos in the built
environment [25]. In the past, construction workers
routinely sprayed, cut and processed asbestos materials
without protective equipment. Japanese laws – such as the

Panel of speakers forworkshop 1.
From left:
Apolinar Tolentino,
Fiona Murie,
Sari Sairanen,
Katsuyuki Iida,
Pat Preston andKiroyuko Kawamoto

12

Pneumoconiosis Law – were inadequate in the face of theincreasing number of silicosis and asbestosis cases. At theend of the 1990s, the Japan Federation of Construction
Workers’ Union (Tokyo branch) in cooperation with theTokyo Occupational Safety and Health Center and the Kameido Himawari Clinic started a grass-roots dust prevention
program for construction workers which consisted of radiographic screening, medical documentation screening andprecautionary training. Over time, there have been improvements to the program:Ŷ since 1998, periodic X-ray screening for pneumoconiosis and other asbestos-related diseases had been conducted;
Ŷ since 2000, the examination of medical documentation had identified cases of occupational respiratory
disease such as lung cancer, mesothelioma etc;
Ŷ since 2002, the trade union had on 36 occasions carried out precautionary training on construction sites;
these participatory action-oriented exercises featured
the use of a training kit and action checklist [26].
Drawing on these experiences, the union concluded thatthe incidence of pneumoconiosis increased with age andthat government certifications underestimated the prevalence of the disease; of 159 patients with suspected pneumoconiosis identified by the union from 2000 to 2006, only
17 were officially recognized as suffering from occupational diseases. Elevated levels of pleural plaques were also
found in male construction workers from the Tokyo area,
indicating that this cohort was exposed to high levels of asbestos. As available resources were limited, only 30% of
all the at-risk workers were examined; more surveillanceand grass-roots dust prevention activity on construction
sites were needed.
Australian construction workers had also experienced highlevels of asbestos exposure according to Pat Preston fromthe Construction Forestry Mining Energy Union of Australia (CFMEU). Over 35 years ago, the CFMEU began an
industrial campaign to ban asbestos, during which building workers refused to use asbestos-containing products.
Booklets, stickers and posters were distributed throughout

Over 35 years ago, the CFMEU began an
industrial campaign to ban asbestos, during
which building workers refused to use asbestoscontaining products …
workplaces where these products were being used to raiseawareness of the hazard; as a result, many building contractors turned their backs on asbestos to avoid costly
work stoppages. At the same time, Australian asbestos manufacturer James Hardie phased out the use of asbestos inconstruction products for the domestic market. As a consequence of these developments, by the mid-1980s, asbestos-free building material was becoming increasingly

popular.
Even though Australia banned asbestos in 2003, the residual problem of contaminated infrastructure persisted andconstruction, maintenance and demolition workers remained at risk of occupational exposures. The union
began a campaign to address this situation which stipulated that prior to the commencement of refurbishments,
an assessment by an environmental consultant was required to determine the amount of asbestos present andthe measures required to carry out the work safely. If abuilding worker was exposed, a letter of exposure was issued which could, if necessary, be used as documentary
evidence in the future.
A program for medical monitoring was being planned inorder to provide an early warning of symptoms. Current
Australian regulations were quite rigid about asbestos
auditing of buildings on a regular basis or during planned
work [27]. Asbestos removal work was conducted by specialists under a licensed regime; the union ran courses formembers of the asbestos removal industry. In light of therisk asbestos posed to members of the public, the CFMEU
provided training courses to educate community members
on how to manage domestic asbestos so as to prevent theunregulated ripping out and disposal of hazardous
products.
Other at-risk groups included workers in the airline,
aerospace, automotive, fisheries, health-care, hospitality,
manufacturing, mining and smelting, railways, shipbuilding, transportation, retail and wholesale industries, according to Sari Sairanen, National Health and Safety Directorof the Canadian Autoworkers Union (CAW) [28]. During

although the government had known that asbestos levels at the foundry far exceeded allowable
concentrations, no attempts had been made to enforce the regulations.
her presentation, CAW Asbestos Action, the speaker focused on the case of the infamous Holmes Foundry. In
1998, the Occupational Health Clinic for Ontario Workers
was informed about a cancer cluster mostly amongst retired workers from the Holmes Foundry. The union became involved and organized an intake clinic, explaining
to the workers the possible dangers to which they had
been exposed. Following a public meeting which was attended by 200+ members and their families, an investigation to identify the cause of their health problems was
begun. Evidence was found which showed that although
the government had known that asbestos levels at thefoundry far exceeded allowable concentrations, no attempts had been made to enforce the regulations. The injured lobbied for official recognition and compensation
for their work-related illnesses; to date, over $30 million
had been obtained for the victims and their families. Other

13

Workshop 1
asbestos scandals uncovered by the CAW were the existence of hazardous asbestos practices at a General Electric
factory and an Air Canada call center.

ment recognized his condition as an occupational disease, Honda did not, and a lawsuit was filed in March
2009;

Building on these victories the CAW had developed an asbestos program which included the following components:
training, worker health organizers, collaboration withhealth and safety committee members and occupational
physicians, bargain protection in collective agreements, lobbying for legislative changes, and support for the abolitionof asbestos use in Canada and overseas. The CAW’s 2003
Asbestos Resolution summed up the union’s policy as follows:Ŷ a subcontractor for Sumitomo shipbuilding diagnosed“the CAW call on the Canadian government to ban theexport of asbestos; withdraw its financial and politicalsupport from the Asbestos Institute; work with the unions and communities involved to ensure a just transition for workers in the asbestos mines andsurrounding communities and lobby for a world wide
ban on the use of asbestos…”
It is well known that many people who contract asbestos-related diseases have already retired, due to the long incubation periods of these illnesses. The problems caused by thelong delay before the disease manifests itself and the ageof the injured were discussed by Hiroyuki Kawamoto,from the Kanagawa Occupational Safety & Health Centre(Japan), in his paper Challenges of Retired Asbestos Workers. In December 2007, the Asbestos Union (AU), a

with mesothelioma, having been exposed to asbestos
at work; he was given no information about asbestosand had no opportunity to protect himself from hazardous occupational exposures; the company denied
liability;Ŷ the AU chairperson who had worked for 40 years as aplumber in an oil company; he had been diagnosed
with pleural plaques and was angry because he wasnever given any information about asbestos.
During the question and answer session which followed
the presentations, issues raised by conference participants
included the following:Ŷ while public awareness had been raised in Korea regarding asbestos contamination of consumer products
due to recent media coverage, workers doing refurbishments and maintenance were still being exposed
to asbestos despite the existence of laws which mandated workplace protection; a national campaign
would be run by the Korea Building and Construction
Union to raise workers’ awareness, identify victims
and begin compensation procedures on their behalf;Ŷ in Canada, the Quebec unions had sided with the asSome companies, however, refused to negotiate
and the AU was currently taking action against
Honda, Nissan and other big Japanesecompanies.
branch of the All Japan Shipbuilding and Engineering
Workers Union, was established specifically to assist retired asbestos workers and people whose family members
had died. Mr. Kawamoto was appointed the General Secretary. The AU demanded information and claimed compensation from former employers of the injured. It brought legal
actions before the Labour Relations Commission, a bodycomposed of representatives from trade unions and companies. To avoid protracted negotiations and a struggle
with the union, companies usually made an offer. The AU
had had cases where the financial sum awarded was
US$200,000. Some companies, however, refused to negotiate and the AU was currently taking action against Honda,
Nissan and other big Japanese companies. Profiles of typical AU members included:

Ŷ a garage worker employed in a Honda factory for 2
years in the mid-1960s who had one lung removed
after he contracted mesothelioma; although the govern-

14

bestos industry to broadcast a message of economic
well-being to asbestos communities; the CAW andother like-minded organizations were lobbying for a“just transition” program to move the mine workers tosafer jobs; although it was a slow process, more politicians were declaring their support, and while the focus of the upcoming general election would be theeconomy, there was an opportunity to exploit thisevent to force politicians to declare their position on
asbestos; the Canadian ban asbestos movement was
re-energizing itself and was re-engaging with allies inpolitical parties, victims’ groups, trade unions and human rights groups to bring pressure on the federal
government to change its pro-asbestos policy;

Ŷ the occupational threat posed by asbestos remained in
post-ban countries; the Asbestos Union (Japan) was a
new type of union; publicity surrounding the cases ofretired workers raised awareness of the asbestos
threat to the current generation of workers.
Having heard many comments from delegates about priorities in Asia regarding asbestos, a consensus was reachedthat the establishment of an Asian Ban Asbestos Network
was crucial.

Workshop 2

Medical Session
Moderators: Professors Domyung Paek and Naomi Hisanaga

Due to heavy consumption of asbestos during the twentieth century, the incidence of asbestos-related diseases in Japan is increasing. For victims to obtain financial relief forthese diseases, it is essential that they receive an accurate
diagnosis of their condition [29]. During the first presentation, Pathological Diagnosis of Asbestos-related Diseases, Professor Kouki Inai of Hiroshima University,
having touched on the range of recognized diseases, concentrated his remarks on the continuing difficulties in making accurate diagnoses. Despite an array of tools such as
clinical findings, laboratory data on serum or effusions
and/or radiographic procedures including chest X-ray, CT
or MRI scans [30], uncertainties remained. The professor
discussed research undertaken by his team into the diagnosis of asbestosis, diffuse pleural thickening and benign asbestos pleurisy using histopathological specimens, andexplained the relevance of non-specific pathology and imaging findings. Although progress on diagnosing mesothelioma with techniques such as immunohistochemical
analysis had been made, new diagnostic tools should be developed through molecular and genetic research. Judging
from the Japanese experience, it was likely that the incidence of asbestos cancer would rise in other Asian countries in the near future.
An attempt to quantify the incidence of disease amongst
ex-workers from an Indian asbestos factory, formerly
called Hindustan Ferodo and later renamed Hindustan Composites Ltd. (HCL) [31], was the subject of the presentation Asbestosis among ex-asbestos Workers of a Mumbai
Asbestos Factory: A Prevalence Study, by Dr. Archana
Kakade from the Mumbai Occupational Health and Safety
Centre. A 2004 study of active HCL workers which founda low incidence of asbestosis in workers led researchers to
postulate that the “healthy worker syndrome” had tainted
the results [32]. To test out this hypothesis, a new study
was undertaken among ex-HCL workers who had
resigned, retired or been forced to resign under the government’s Voluntary Retirement Scheme (VRS) [33]. Interviews were conducted, occupational histories were taken
and the health of workers was accessed during phase 1(April-June 2008) and phase 2 (July 2008-January 2009)of this project. The prevalence rate of asbestosis among exHCL workers in the recent study was 49%, as opposed to
23% in the 2004 cohort of active HCL workers.
Recognizing the multitude of problems faced by asbestosinjured workers in Mumbai, recommendations made by
the speaker included: banning asbestos in India, the mandatory introduction of a national medical surveillance program for workers occupationally exposed to asbestos,
occupational health training for doctors, the introductionof efficient industrial engineering controls, the reductionof allowable asbestos concentrations from 1 fiber/cc to 0.1
fiber/cc, the use of respiratory equipment and personal
protective equipment, regular asbestos fiber monitoring,
good housekeeping practices, and a program of asbestos
education for all personnel.
High incidences of asbestos-related diseases have beenfound in Korean regions where asbestos fiber was mined,
according to the presentation by Dr. Yeon-Soon Ahn of
the Department of Occupational Medicine, Dongguk College, Goyang, Korea [34]. The results of an epidemiological survey undertaken by a team of Korean and Japanese
researchers were detailed in the paper: Environmental
Fallout from Asbestos Pollution in Korea – Asbestosis
Epidemics from Neighborhood Exposure in Chungnam
Province, Korea.
Due to para-occupational domestic and neighborhood exposures and exposure to naturally occurring asbestos,
there was no difference in the prevalence rates of asbestosis and pleural plaques between miners and non-miners,
i.e. members of the public who lived near the mines. Thisconclusion was the result of an epidemiological survey of
215 residents from five villages located within two kilometers of three asbestos mining sites. As a result of chest
X-rays, 110 of the study subjects (51%) were suspected ofhaving asbestos-related diseases; 95 were submitted for
CT scans which established that 55 (64%) had asbestosis
and 87 (92%) had pleural plaques [35]. Following up on
the results of this work, the Korean Ministry of Environment was conducting an epidemiological survey of 10,000
residents who lived near 15 asbestos mines in Chungnam
province. A Center for Asbestosis-related Environmental
Disease had been established and a bill to provide assistance for environmental asbestos victims had been introduced.

during 2005-2006 there was a total of 3,365 Japanese workers compensated by the government
for mesothelioma and lung cancer …
Asbestos-related Lung Cancer among Japanese Construction Workers was the title of the talk given by Professor Naomi Hisanaga of the Aichi University of
Education, Japan. Pictures shown of working practices
during the 1980s backed up data which detailed incrediblyhigh levels of asbestos exposure experienced by construction workers. Airborne asbestos concentrations exceeding
100 fibers/ml during the cutting of asbestos-containing
boards using electric circular saws were not unusual. The
researchers calculated that during 2005-2006 there was a
total of 3,365 Japanese workers compensated by the gov-

15

Workshop 2
immunocytochemical staining, computed tomography
imaging techniques, positron emission tomography (PET
scanning) and the use of blood biomarkers (mesothelin)[38] which, in some cases, had helped doctors make earlier diagnoses. Despite the progress, there was no cure formesothelioma; front-line agents for treatment remained
the use of a platinum agent plus an anti-metabolite such as
pemetrexed and gemcitabine; new therapies featured theuse of 2-drug combination chemotherapies with immunotherapy. Radical surgery was only recommended for selected cases and should be carried out in centers of
excellence and in conjunction with adjuvant therapy. Genetherapy was still experimental.

Cutting operations resulted in exposures as high as
787 fibers/ml. Here, the level was 131 fibers/ml
ernment for mesothelioma and lung cancer, of which
1,387 (41%) worked in construction [36]; the second
highest group affected were workers in shipbuilding who
accounted for a total of 444 cases (13%).
Despite the acknowledged high-risk nature of construction
work, many of the asbestos-injured from this industry did
not qualify for compensation. Out of 34 lung-cancer patients whose details were recorded by the construction
workers’ health insurance society in Mie prefecture, 12(35%) did not fulfill the criteria needed to obtain government compensation. Recognizing that construction workers remained on the asbestos front line, as evidenced byphotographs showing hazardous working practices during
current refurbishment work and demolition, the speakerconcluded that current compensation requirements neededaltering, so that all construction workers who suffered illness as a result of their occupational asbestos exposures obtained the benefits to which they were entitled. Regarding
improved controls of hazardous exposures at current building sites promised by the government, the professor said
that research on the carcinogenic potential of low-dose asbestos exposures was needed.
In the last 10-15 years, research on the treatment of mesothelioma had produced chemotherapy protocols for improving the duration and quality of life of mesothelioma
patients, said Professor Bruce Robinson in his presentation: Latest Data on Mesothelioma Diagnosis and Treatment. Much of this work had been conducted in Australia,
the country with the world’s worst incidence of mesothelioma. Whereas the U.S., Europe and Japan had incidence
rates of 15, 18 and 7 per million respectively, Australia’s
rate was 40 per million [37]. In Australia, mesothelioma
was no longer restricted to occupational cohorts such as asbestos mine workers, boilermakers, insulators, dockers
and construction workers, “mesothelioma is now a diseaseof ‘the man in the street’ – almost everyone has asbestos intheir lungs.”
Improvements had been made in diagnostic tools such as

16

The final presentation of the workshop reprised themes
highlighted by speakers from Japan and Korea but placed
them within an Australian context. Dr. Greg Deleuil, Medical Advisor to the Asbestos Diseases Society of Australia,
spoke about Asbestosis in the Aftermath of Cyclone
Tracy, a massive storm which struck Darwin, in Australia’s Northern Territory, on December 24, 1974. In just
8 hours, winds of 270 km/h demolished most of the built
environment leaving behind a city-sized asbestos-contaminated demolition site. The fact that most of the buildingsin Darwin had been constructed of asbestos-containing
building products meant that there were high levels of airborne asbestos in the aftermath of the cyclone. The speaker and his family who had lived in Darwin relocated to thecity of Perth after the storm.
Photographs were shown which evidenced the destructive
havoc wreaked by the cyclone; pictures of clean-up personnel wearing leather gloves, floppy hats and work boots
showed them shoveling the debris or using heavy machinery to remove wreckage. The responders – personnel
from the armed forces, day laborers and volunteers – had

The fact that most of the buildings in Darwin
had been constructed of asbestos-containing
building products meant that there were highlevels of airborne asbestos in the aftermath ofthe cyclone.
no breathing equipment or protective clothing. There were
no health and safety regulations in place to minimize occupational exposures. In the last few months, the speaker
had diagnosed two of the clean-up crew with asbestosis;
there was no way to predict how many other emergency
workers or Darwin residents would contract an asbestosrelated disease as a result of encountering Cyclone Tracy.
During the discussion phase of the workshop, the medical
experts were asked technical questions about specimen
preparation, ethics and techniques for screening patients,
immunotherapy and the suitability of patients for radical
surgery. There was a consensus that, as of then, no gold
standard had been identified for treating mesothelioma patients.

Break-out Session 1

Potential Asian Claims on U.S. Asbestos Bankruptcy Trusts
Moderator: Steven Kazan

This session was a master class on how U.S. asbestos bankruptcy trusts funds can be accessed by foreign claimants[39]. The speaker, who had been intimately involved withthe construction of many of these trusts and was extremely
knowledgeable about their modus operandi, used a wellconstructed PowerPoint presentation to take delegates
through the claims process [40]. The submission of claims
was not unduly complex, was free of any filing charges
and did not require the services of a local or U.S. lawyer;
however, all supporting documentation must be accompanied by certified abstracts or translations into English. It
was more cost efficient for victims’ groups or trade unions
to bring the claims on behalf of their members than to pay
a lawyer 25%+ of the monies obtained. All the trust funds,
which collectively held $33 billion in assets, had websites
and information was easily accessible online; forms could
be downloaded and claims could be submitted by email.

Peru (154), Venezuela (114), Portugal (95), Italy (95),Columbia (82), Chile (79), Japan (79), India (65), Dominican Republic (59), Argentina (58), Spain 55 [41].
As the U.S. boilermaker Babcock & Wilcox (B&W) had
the most approved foreign sites (2,285) and ships (8,022),
it was the focus of the remarks illustrating how a claim
could be pursued. From links on the B&W Asbestos Trust
website, you could access information on: how to file aclaim, qualifications for payment, popular downloads,
B&W approved site lists and significant occupational exposure ratings [42]. Useful website features included:
FAQs, a glossary, video training programs, online tools
and documents for downloading such as instructions forfiling a claim, a claim form, a B&W exposure affidavit,
etc. For a B&W claim to succeed, claimants must show:
exposure to a B&W product, the name and location of theworksite, their occupation when they worked with the contaminated product, the length of time they worked withthe product, their disease, their dependents and their economic loss (optional). If someone was employed at aworksite already on the approved B&W site list, the process was even more straightforward than otherwise.
Many non-U.S. workers might have been exposed to
B&W boilers on board ships; the speaker showed how a
few minutes on the internet could establish if a ship wasconstructed with B&W boilers installed. Taking as his example a Korean naval vessel called the ROKS Chung Mu,
a few Google searches showed that:Ŷ before 1963, the Chung Mu had been an American
naval vessel called the USS Erben; it was launched in1943 in Maine and was sold to the Korean Navy in1963;Ŷ the Erben (DD-631) was a Fletcher-class destroyer;
Ŷ four B & W boilers were standard for Fletcher-classdestroyers.

Lists shown by the speaker detailed 2,980 sites and 13,056
ships on which one or more of the trusts acknowledged liability in scores of countries; those countries with themost sites were: Cuba (504), Mexico (387), Brazil (236),

Throughout the session, questions were asked on a rangeof procedural issues; such as the value of claims, feasibility of bringing a claim if a victim worked for a subsidiary,difficulties in bringing claims arising from exposures atforeign sites not on the approved list, status of a claim
when a victim dies (the claim survives and is processedon behalf of surviving relatives), time frame, evidence required to prove employment and income. The session concluded with an offer of ongoing advice and consultation toNGOs and victims’ group representatives at no charge.
NB. The slides from this presentation, which include detailed
instructions for submitting claims to US bankruptcy trusts, can be seenon the speaker's website: http://www.kazanlaw.com/AACWorkshop

17

Break-out Session 2

Building the Asian Ban Asbestos Network
Moderator: Yeyong Choi

During this session, delegates debated theway forward. In discussions and in conversations which took place within smaller
subregional groups, a consensus emerged
on campaign themes and strategies. Available regional resources were comparedwith those required to achieve specified
goals and suggestions were made on how
to bridge the gaps identified. While fullminutes of these discussions have been
made available to the members of the Asian
Ban Asbestos Network (A-BAN), only
AAC 2009 delegates are privy to the decisions taken during this session.

Subregional group discussions

Asbestosis sufferer Jung Ji-Yul, aleading member of the Korean
National Network of Asbestos
Victims and Their Families andactive participant in BANKO

18

Workshop 3

Practical Considerations for Minimizing the Asbestos Hazard
Moderators: Andy Oberta and Dave Hodgkin

In his capacity as an Environmental Housing and Emergency Shelter Consultant, Dave Hodgkin was ideallyplaced to address the subject of Post-disaster Recovery
and the Problem of Asbestos. Unfortunately, the global impact of infrastructural damage from disasters was increasing, especially in Asia which was experiencing a dramaticrise in emergency-caused homelessness and environmental
asbestos contamination. The main asbestos challenges during emergency situations such as those caused by the Indian Ocean tsunami (2004) or the Yogyakarta (Indonesia)
earthquake (2006) were dealing with asbestos-contaminated rubble and preventing the use of new asbestos duringreconstruction efforts [43]. Responding to the high levelsof basic human need created by the extensive destructionof domestic and national infrastructures was done in conditions which were far from ideal; previous attempts at asbestos education – such as posters recommending prevention
methods had little impact [44].
On the ground, local asbestos industrialists viewed an emer-

gency as “a big sales opportunity” to market theirproducts which, they claimed, were cheaper, stronger,
lighter, more waterproof and easier to install than the alternatives. In Yogyakarta, some programs chose “community procurement-based models” which included rules
against the purchase of asbestos-containing materials. In
some cases these rules were overlooked, whilst in others
although the agency specified and purchased asbestos-freeroofing when the material was tested they discovered it
had been falsely marketed and contained asbestos. Thiswas because it was cheaper for companies to keep using
old technology rather than upgrade to the different machines required to produce cellulose-fiber reinforced
sheets, and there was little or no control over the use of asbestos in countries like Indonesia.
“Current guidelines,” the speaker said “are complex andineffective.” What was needed was more broadly agreed
and much simpler messaging like “keep it wet,” onposters, leaflets etc. that could be pre-prepared in local lan-In the aftermath of natural disasters,
clean-up operations usually require theremoval of large amounts ofcontaminated debris, as evidenced bythis mound of building rubble at Aceh.

Easily identified asbestos debris
at Aceh.

19

Workshop 3
guages for the top 20 disaster-prone countries. Such messages needed to be made available in conjunction withsimple tools and procedures to minimize hazardous exposures; unless these resources were available immediately, affected communities (who were the primary actors inpost-disaster clean-ups) would continue to respond as previously – asbestos-contaminated rubble would be swept up
by hand or machine and then dumped haphazardly andbroken asbestos products would be used for temporary
housing.
Ideally, an international agency with a ring-fenced budget
and a mandate to advise on asbestos issues during emergency situations should be enfranchised to develop practical guidelines (and translate them into various languages),
send personnel to disaster zones, help coordinate asbestos
policy amongst local governments and aid providers, andprogress the debate on phasing out the future use of asbestos in the affected country. Having seen the highly graphic
photographs which illustrated Hodgkin’s talk, there is little
doubt that these recommendations should be considered apriority.
The majority of asbestos used globally has been in the production of asbestos-cement building materials. Even when

It is a myth that asbestos fibers are locked firmly
in a cement matrix; in fact fibers are readily
released from asbestos-cement surfaces.
countries ban the new use of asbestos, the presence of
these products constitutes a threat to public and occupational health. In the presentation A Holistic Approach to Managing Asbestos Hazards, Environmental Consultant Andy
Oberta discounted myths propagated by industry about asbestos cement, stating categorically that:Ŷ asbestos-cement roofing and siding could releasefibers inside and outside buildings;

moval project management;

Ŷ ASTM E2394 Asbestos Cement; about work practices
for installed materials;

Ŷ ASTM Manual on Asbestos Control: Surveys, Removal and Management – Second Edition, which explained the use of the ASTM standards [46].
With the use of a flow chart, the speaker explained how,taken together, these standards provided a scientificallyvalidated framework for managing asbestos materials.
Compliance with the ASTM asbestos-cement standards involved the prohibition of cutting with high-speed powersaws, burnishing with high-speed wire brushes, cleaning
with compressed air, high-pressure water blasting and there-use and re-cycling of asbestos products. Concluding his
presentation, the speaker said that “to use this holistic approach an infrastructure involving the public and private
sectors is needed.”Some of the lessons learned by the Irish Electricity Supply Board (ESB) [47] in dealing with asbestos installed inits 30 power stations from 1927 to 1968 were the subjectof the presentation ESB Experience of Remediating Asbestos Contaminated Land, by Patrick Colman. After the
ESB banned the new use of asbestos in its facilities(1968), codes of practice for managing asbestos, which exceeded requirements laid down in national legislation,
were put into place.
After a review of the ESB’s asbestos policy (1990), a 6year plan was drawn up to remove all accessible asbestos
from power stations; a budget of 13 million Irish pounds
was allocated. While the removal of asbestos insulation
was straightforward, the remediation of some former
dump sites was problematic. In the 1960s, asbestos waste
was disposed of with ordinary power station waste onsites within the grounds. After safety legislation was adopted in Ireland to protect workers (1972), all removed asbestos was bagged and disposed of in separate sites on
station grounds [48].

Ŷ asbestos fibers were readily released from asbestos-cement surfaces;Ŷ asbestos cement could be crumbled to powder byhand pressure;Ŷ paint and encapsulants did not offer permanent protection against asbestos fiber release.
Standards had been developed for the management of asbestos materials, including asbestos-cement building
products, by the ASTM, the world’s largest producer of voluntary consensus standards [45]:Ŷ ASTM E2356 Standard Practice for Comprehensive
Building Asbestos Surveys, which dealt with baseline
surveys, sampling, exposure assessments and project
design surveys;
Ŷ ASTM E1368 Standard Practice for Visual Inspectionof Asbestos Abatement Projects, which focused on re-20

As a result of the pre-1972 regime, locating areas wherecontaminated debris had been dumped could necessitate afair amount of detective work: station records were consulted, former staff were interviewed and samples were taken
at suspected sites – such as ash ponds. An incident in October 1998 illustrated the costly consequences of exporting soil from an industrial site. A contractor, who had
sought in-fill from ESB for a housing development, inadvertently removed soil from the site of a local power station which had been used as an asbestos disposal site.
When ESB staff became aware of this they immediately
contacted people living in the development and started theprocess of recovering the contaminated soil. The area inthe housing development was cordoned off and over a
period of two months the ESB removed a considerable
amount of asbestos-contaminated waste [49]. To carry out
the decontamination, the company developed a manage-

ment structure to oversee the work and a detailed methodology which specified techniques for surveying, sampling,risk assessment, remediation, inspection and air monitoring [50]. “The ESB has,” concluded the speaker “built up
unique experience in managing the remediation and development of asbestos contaminated sites.”
The division in the United States between federal and state
powers to regulate occupational health and safety issues
creates gaps through which workers can be exploited, Vincent Brennan told delegates during his presentation: The
Art of Applying Science to Asbestos Abatement: A Moral
Obligation to Minimize Exposure While Maintaining
Costs [51].
In 1995, as a result of a sting set by the University of Vermont, the use of unskilled and untrained illegal workers toremove asbestos was discovered. Twelve years later, afirm in Massachusetts was convicted on 28 felony countsof conspiracy, false payroll tax returns, counterfeit training
records, non-payment of taxes and the use of illegal aliens
to carry out asbestos work. Even where states, such as Vermont, had developed criteria to implement a federal accreditation plan, confusion persisted because of a lack of
coordination amongst the different state departments
tasked with enforcing the regulations.
The University of Vermont had developed a flexible protocol for asbestos removal and management projects
which had achieved multiple benefits for business by focusing on performance-based activities, streamlining the procurement process, maintaining competition andcontracting job ordering. Web based documentation increased financial transparency and ensured that the abatement process was properly managed; everything was
documented consistently and efficiently so that more timeand resources could be used to monitor work daily. The responsibilities of the various parties – owners, contractors,
supervisors, workers – were clearly stipulated.

cause hazardous airborne concentrations. A project recently completed in Vienna, Austria illustrates how theuse of up-to-date technology and management systems
can accomplish the safe removal of sprayed-asbestos fireproofing even under difficult circumstances. In thepresentation Asbestos Removal in a Subway Station During Operation, Engineer Heinz Kropiunik [52] outlined
the requirements of this project:

Ŷ removal of 2,500 m² of sprayed asbestos from the ceiling of the subway station by 40 workers over a periodof eight months; decontamination of all cables;Ŷ workers, positioned on scaffolding [53] above the platform on which the passengers were waiting, had towork in a confined space (less than a meter high);Ŷ 30,000 passengers used the station every day.
Throughout the asbestos removal, air monitoring was carried out on the passenger platforms of the subway station
as well as in the working zone above. The use of scores ofphotographs by the speaker illustrated the difficulties
posed by this project and the technical solutions which

Cramped working conditions
were found so that the removal work could continue while
the station was open to normal traffic.

This new regime increased the ownership of all the actors,
helped foster long-term relationships and increased safety
not only relating to asbestos exposures but also for occupational risks such as electrical hazards, slips, falls and heatand cold exposures. Larger institutions had a moral obligation to hold contractors accountable, stipulate their expectations, ensure consistent working practices and train
workers and supervisors. There were better workers and supervisors in Vermont and a higher level of protection for asbestos abatement workers as a result of the approach
designed by the University of Vermont.

Asbestos cement is big business in China, the world’s
largest user of asbestos. There are more than 400 factories
with 600 production lines annually outputting 300 million
m² of asbestos-cement corrugated sheeting, said the next
speaker, Lin Zhen [54] in his presentation: Developmentof Non-asbestos Fiber Cement Products in China. Even
though the continuing use of asbestos was supported bystakeholders from the mining and construction industries,
in light of the asbestos health hazard [55] research had
been carried out in the last 20 years into the production ofasbestos-free cement:

Throughout the world, sprayed-asbestos insulation wasused on a massive scale during the twentieth century; evenwhen new this material was highly friable and therefore
capable of liberating asbestos fibers when handled. Whenit was decades old, such as was the case in the situation described by the next speaker, it was even more likely toŶ autoclaved cellulose-fiber reinforced cement (CCA);
CCA flat boards were used for sidings, partitions andceilings. More than 200,000 m² of CCA boards wereused in the Grand Stadium and other constructions for
the Beijing 2008 Olympic Games (the use of asbestos
was not permitted in the Olympic buildings); other21Workshop 3
key construction projects which used CCA boards
were the South Station of Shanghai Subway line No. 1
and the Sino-French Centre in Tongji University,
Shanghai.

Ŷ vinylon-fiber reinforced cement (VRC) corrugatedsheets, flat boards and cable protection pipes weremainly being sold to the domestic market with someoverseas sales; as the costs of VRC corrugated sheets
were relatively high, demand was low.

Ŷ glass-fiber reinforced cement (GRC) products were especially suitable for architectural decorative components and landscape decorative art works. Other
applications were: lightweight partition panels, roofslabs with pre-stressed concrete ribs for grid structure,exterior wall panels, ventilation ducts and tube-shaped
form works.
Despite these innovations, in 2005 asbestos-cement corrugated sheets and flat sheets accounted for 92% of all salesof fiber-cement roof and wall materials. Even so, the total
dominance of asbestos cement was over and a transitional
period had begun, during which asbestos cement and nonasbestos fiber cement would co-exist. The market for autoclaved calcium silicate board had been increasing quickly
in recent years. The speaker believed that “non-asbestos
fiber cement products represented the future developmentof the fiber-cement industry in China.”
As in China, asbestos-cement products continued to be popular in Vietnam and 50 factories produced nearly 100 million square meters of asbestos roofing sheets every year.
In the presentation given by Nguyen Dinh Kien on theTechnology and Equipment for the Production of Non-asbestos Corrugated Cement Sheets in Vietnam, the speaker detailed major problems experienced in Vietnam in theindustrial conversion of the Hatschek cement production
process from asbestos to non-asbestos technology, such asfiber balling, delaminating, low cement yield and cracking[56]. In 1988, personnel at the Research Institute of Technology for Machinery (RMIT) started development work on

the Hatschek process and machinery design for the asbestos-cement industry; twelve years later, they extended
their research to the investigation of a production methodology and equipment for non-asbestos technology. In
2007, as a result of collaboration with Kuraray and Dipro
International of Japan, RMIT succeeded in developing ahighly efficient, low energy consuming, highly automated
PVA-cement production line.
Pictures were shown of TTC, Vietnam’s first PVA-cement
sheet factory; TTC asbestos-free corrugated cement sheets
satisfied stringent tests for mechanical and physical behavior. As these products complied with Korean standards,
exports were now being sent to that country. Although
non-asbestos technology was, said the speaker: “very different in the equipment and production methods used andrequires experienced engineers to solve the many technical changes, the achievement of non-asbestos technology in
Vietnam opens the way for the replacement of asbestos in
the fiber-cement industry in Vietnam and other countries
which continue to use asbestos-cement products.”
During the discussion which followed the presentations,delegates expressed particular interest in the developmentof asbestos-free technology in China and Vietnam. In
China, the availability of local raw materials meant that
costly imports could be avoided. If you had needed to import raw materials said Mr. Lin Zhen, production costs
would have been up to 30% higher. Even though production costs of asbestos-free materials in Vietnam wereabout 20% higher, some countries (Indonesia) had expressed interest in the new technology. With regard tomechanical properties, PVA cement was of a better standard than asbestos cement. PVA cement had also proved
popular in Brazil which had now developed the ability to
produce PVA locally in order to avoid the high costs of imports. The same equipment used for asbestos manufacturing had been adopted for the production of PVA cement.
Although energy costs were 10-15% higher, output andnew investment in the Brazilian PVA-cement industry
were increasing.

TTC, Vietnam’s first
PVA-cement sheet
factory22

Plenary Session 3Country Reports
Moderator: Apo Leung

The title of the presentation by Indian activist Madhumita
Dutta, Asbestos Kills! India in Denial!, was indicative of
the content of the first presentation of the morning [57].
The escalation of asbestos use in India – now the world’s
largest importer of asbestos [58] – had taken place in circumstances created to maximize corporate profits andwith no regard for occupational or public safety. Even as
government agencies claimed the situation was under control, citing lack of epidemiological data, politicians reaped
the profits from the asbestos factories and mines theyowned; the state of Tamil Nadu owned a large asbestos factory. The growth of the asbestos industrial sector had beenencouraged by government incentives such as the de-licensing of asbestos, which was nowadays no longer classed asa hazardous import, and the relatively high level of allowable industrial airborne asbestos concentration: 2 f/cc;
there was virtually no enforcement of the few regulations
which existed for minimizing hazardous exposures.

Even as government agencies claimed the situation
was under control, citing lack of epidemiological
data, politicians reaped the profits from theasbestos factories and mines they owned.
There was some asbestos mining in India but the output
was small and unable to satisfy national demand. There
were illegal tremolite asbestos mines [59] in Rajasthan
and chrysotile asbestos mines in Cuddapah, Andhra Pradesh. Miners, all of whom were unprotected, worked with
their bare hands to extract the fiber. Mining operations had
grossly contaminated communities such as the towns neara redundant asbestos mine in Roro, Chaibasa, Jharkhand.
Twenty years ago mining operations ceased but there had
been no attempt to remediate the area and children played
amidst the contamination.
More than 100,000 people worked in India’s asbestos sectors. In addition, there were the thousands employed in the
ship-breaking industry who were also routinely exposed tothe asbestos hazard, not to mention the members of the public exposed to asbestos waste dumped by the shipyards,
and the millions of consumers, especially in rural areas
and urban slums, exposed to asbestos-cement roofing materials; over 90% of asbestos used in India went into the
production of roofing materials. There were no publicly accessible government data on the number of workers at risk
from asbestos, the scale of asbestos dumping, the incidence of asbestos-related disease or the threat to consumers. Independent studies had found a prevalence ofasbestos-related diseases, e.g. the Tata Cancer Memorial
Hospital admitted to treating 107 cases of mesothelioma

from 1985-2005. Government agencies were largely incompetent.
Organizing the victims was not easy. Most of the at-risk
workers were from the unorganized sector: contract workers, day workers, migrant workers, all of whom were difficult to locate and identify. Other problems included
difficulties in getting medical diagnoses (asbestos diseases
were often misdiagnosed, sometimes as TB), obtaining occupational histories and filing for compensation; becauseof the complexities of India’s labor laws, it was difficult
to hold companies liable for occupational illnesses. Despite these challenges, small victims’ groups were now being formed.
In his capacity as the Director of the National Institute ofOccupational Safety and Health of Sri Lanka’s Ministryof Labor, Dr. Hemantha Wickramatillake discussed: Asbestos Use and Related Health Status in Sri Lanka. Common asbestos exposures included those which took placein manufacturing plants, during building demolition orroof removals, during tsunami clean-up work, in the useof asbestos brake pads and other consumer products, andvia environmental exposure. The regulations which pertained to occupational asbestos exposures at Sri Lanka’s
six asbestos manufacturing plants were weak and old, dating back to the 1950s; there was a reluctance by industry
stakeholders to engage in discussions on the asbestos hazard. Nevertheless, a new law had been drawn up thatwould come into force in 2009 and list the asbestos industry as hazardous, mandate the reporting of asbestos-related illness and introduce stringent workplace controls inall sectors.
There was a notable lack of asbestos awareness not only
among the public and the workforce but also among professionals and government officials. In the past, a former
Director of the National Cancer Institute publicly statedthat there was no risk of malignancy from the use ofchrysotile asbestos. Propaganda spread by asbestos lobbyists firmly lodged this sentiment in the public consciousness. The lack of mortality and disease data on theincidence of asbestos-related diseases was used to support
industry’s false assurances. Compounding these factors
was widespread medical ignorance on occupational medicine; there had been only one case of occupational mesothelioma reported during the last few years. Although, theILO’s adoption (2006) of a policy to phase out the use ofasbestos had encouraged the authorities in Sri Lanka totake action, there were multiple challenges to be faced before a national ban could be adopted:
Ŷ lack of data and national statistics;

23

Plenary Session 3
Ŷ lack of asbestos awareness among legislators, medical

pursued, in conjunction with other social partners were:

professionals, the public, trade unions and workers;
Ŷ lack of information on effective and cost-efficient asbestos-free alternatives.

Ŷ an asbestos roundtable on International Workers’ Me-

Having heard from an activist and a civil servant, it was
highly appropriate that the next speaker was trade unionist
Gerard Seno who is the National Vice President of the Associated Labor Unions – Trade Union Congress of the Philippines (ALU-TUCP) [60].

morial Day, 2006;

Ŷ a ban asbestos workshop for local union leaders, 2006;
Ŷ seminars to raise grass-roots asbestos awareness,2006;

Ŷ meetings with government agencies, 2006-2008;
Ŷ an asbestos forum for grass-roots groups, 2007;
Ŷ political lobbying (2008) on Asbestos Senate Bill No.
741 and House Bill No. 2079;

Although the Philippines Constitution guaranteed therights of workers to just and humane conditions of work,and provisions of the Occupational Safety and HealthŶ a 2009 bilateral meeting with key political leaders to“Only the Department of Health (DOH) sees theneed to stop the use of asbestos to eliminate
asbestos-related diseases”

A detailed strategy was discussed for taking the campaign
forward in the Philippines which included political lobbying, building relationships with government agencies, an
education program and use of new technology to reach awider audience.

Standards aimed to protect workers against injury, sickness or death through safe working conditions, the daily
reality of workers in the asbestos industry, on building
sites and at former U.S. bases – Subic Bay, Zambales and
Clark, in the northern province of Pampagna – was tainted by high levels of hazardous asbestos exposure. According to a graph shown by the speaker, asbestos
consumption in the Philippines peaked in 1970 at 4,500
tons, went down to 2,900 tons in 1975, shot up to 3,400
tons in 1980 and since then had continued to rise. As a result of unsafe working conditions, thousands of workers remained at risk as the import, manufacture, processing anduse of chrysotile asbestos and asbestos-containing
products were allowed in the Philippines [61].
Within the government there was a conflict of opinion
about the asbestos hazard; the majority of departments supported a policy of controlled use. Under this regime, theregulated use of chrysotile in certain high-density products
continued but the use of other types of asbestos (amosite,
crocidolite, etc.) and the spraying of all forms of asbestos
remained banned. There was a dichotomy between departments; the Construction Industry Authority of the Philippines, the Environmental Management Bureau and the
Bureau of Working Conditions either felt that controlled
use remained the way forward or that the case for change
had not been made; either way they did not support an outright ban. “Only the Department of Health (DOH) sees theneed to stop the use of asbestos to eliminate asbestosrelated diseases,” accepting ILO recommendations.
A trade union coalition made up of the ALU, TUCP and
the BWI had developed a two-pronged asbestos campaign
which lobbied for the passage of a worker-friendly law
based on internationally accepted standards and instruments banning asbestos [62] and the expansion of mandatory measures to minimize hazardous exposures. Initiatives
to raise awareness of the asbestos hazards which had been

24

pave the way for a third bill, incorporating ALUTUCP proposals, to ban asbestos.

Asbestos Scenario in Pakistan was the title of the presentation by Associate Professor Dr. Noor Jehan from the Department of Environmental Sciences, University ofPeshawar, Pakistan. There were no national regulations on
the use, import, sale, work with or disposal of asbestos.
Asbestos mining operations began in Pakistan in 1958;
two years later, asbestos importing began with an initial
shipment of 60 tons. Pakistan was currently sourcing
30,000 tons/year of asbestos from abroad and producing
more than 30,000 tons/year locally. Seventy percent ofmines now producing asbestos in Pakistan became operational between 2000-2007; there were no standards or regulations to protect the miners. Measurements taken by the
speaker showed colossal airborne asbestos levels at themine itself and extensive contamination of miners’ work
clothes and groundwater. To meet sustained high levels of
demand, raw fiber and asbestos-containing products were
imported by multinational and local companies for use inconstruction materials, furniture [63], insulation products,
water pipes, friction materials, etc.

Seventy percent of mines now producing
asbestos in Pakistan became operational
between 2000-2007 …
The ubiquity of asbestos use meant that contaminatedproducts were everywhere: in houses, public places suchas ministerial buildings, academic institutes, schools, offices, hospitals, playgrounds, and throughout the construction and industrial sectors. Airborne sampling bypolarized light microscopy, X-ray diffraction and scanningelectron microscopy had shown that industrial workers,
students, patients, children, women and even infants were
exposed to high levels of airborne asbestos fibers in different parts of Pakistan. Another particularly worrying issue
was the asbestos contamination of talc produced inPakistan which had been documented by the speaker. As aing products such as roofing materials, insulation
products, brake systems, etc. In an attempt to assess theimpact that asbestos operations had on a local community,
staff from LIPS began exploratory discussions with personnel from the Public Health District Office, the Manpower Office and Social Security Department, workers
from the PT Jeil Fajar asbestos factory and community
members who lived nearby. These discussions followedon from work conducted in Cibinong, Bogor (2008) by a
Korean–Indonesian research team which found indications that workers and local people living within a 500
meter radius of the factory were suffering from lung disorders of an unknown origin.

This decision marks a sea change in Pakistan’s policy on asbestos.

Following consultation with public health bodies, an investigation was made of occupational conditions in the
Bogor area, which established that asbestos was being
used in the manufacture of toys; although health department staff said they would like to take action on the asbestos hazard, they could not do so due to lack of resources.
In March 2009, LIPS held a workshop with stakeholders,
including local government officials, asbestos workers,
community representatives and occupational health andsafety specialists. As a result of the recommendations approved by that meeting, LIPS began a program to identify
asbestos victims in the Bogor industrial zone. This work
would need to overcome obstacles presented by the lackof transparency of government departments and the entrenched bureaucracy which stymied grass-roots mobilization in Indonesia. Efforts were being made to work withtrade unions to identify asbestos-using factories in the
Bogor area. Training for the PT Jeil Fajar workforce
would be undertaken to raise awareness of the asbestos
hazard. Building on the outcome of the asbestos work conducted at this factory, the LIPS outreach project would be
extended to include other occupational safety and healthhazards in Bogor, Krawang and Tangerang. Links would
be forged with other social actors such as medical professionals, environmental activists and groups campaigning
for OSH rights. The lessons learned and the network created by this grass-roots-led initiative would constitute thefoundation of the Indonesian Ban Asbestos Network.

Community activist Muthamad Darisman from the Sedane
Labour Resource Center (LIPS) described a grass-roots initiative in the Bogor District, West Java for: Setting up a
Ban Asbestos Network in Indonesia – Bridging UnionCommunity Gap. There were no laws in Indonesia which
regulated the use of asbestos, no data on the incidence ofasbestos-related diseases, no official attempts to identify asbestos victims and a low level of asbestos awarenessamongst government officials and members of the public.
Within this context, the use of asbestos and asbestos-containing products was substantial at 58,060 tons/year; Indonesia was the world’s 8th largest importer, producer,
and consumer of asbestos and asbestos-containing material [69]. Data from the Manpower Department estimatedthat in 2004, 7,233 people worked with asbestos-contain-

Another community activist, Trevor Sun, Project Managerof the Hong Kong Workers' Health Centre (HKWHC)[70], shared his experiences with conference delegates in
the presentation: Ban Asbestos Campaign in HongKong. Although the use of amosite and crocidolite asbestos was banned in Hong Kong by the Environmental Protective Department under s. 80 of the Air Pollution
Control Ordinance (1996), the use of chrysotile remained
legal. Nevertheless, recent import levels of raw fiber andchrysotile-containing products had fallen from 121 and107 tons respectively in 2003 and 2004 to 47 tons in2007 [71]. Hong Kong sectors where occupational exposure to chrysotile continued included: vehicle servicing(brake and clutch linings), lift servicing (brake pads),building maintenance, boiler repair work, demolition andresult of these widespread exposures, there were high incidences of asbestos-related cancers such as mesothelioma[64] and cancers of the lungs, larynx, gastrointestinal tract
and ovaries in Pakistan [65]. It was likely that asbestos mortality would rise dramatically in the coming decades. In July 2005, Pakistan ratified the Rotterdam Convention [66].
Since then the government had set up a National TechnicalAdvisory Committee on Chemicals which had its first meeting in 2008. At a subsequent meeting on April 21, 2009,
data which the speaker had accumulated since 1990 on asbestos issues in Pakistan were presented; as a result of thisthe government decided to include all types of asbestos ona list of hazardous materials. The minutes of that meeting
noted:“1/6 – After detailed deliberations on the use, hazards
and risks to human health and environment and its alternatives, the Committee decided that Chrysotile Asbestos may be brought under PIC Procedure within
six months [67].
2/6 – Complete phasing out mechanism for Chrysotile
Asbestos will be developed in next three years.” [68]25Plenary Session 3
ship-breaking. The number of workers being exposed to asbestos was unknown.
The number of mesothelioma cases documented in Hong
Kong rose from a total of 30 by 1995, to 60+ by 2004; average mesothelioma mortality between 2001 and 2004 was
10 deaths/year with a peak of 15 in 2002. Construction
workers featured prominently amongst the groups of workers at risk of contracting mesothelioma due to high levelsof asbestos used in the 1960s-1970s and the long latency
period of asbestos cancer. In 2006, HKWHC staff, working with sufferers, family members and trade unionists,began a campaign to add mesothelioma to the list of compensated illnesses included in the Pneumoconiosis Compensation Ordinance. Success was achieved when the
Pneumoconiosis Compensation Fund Board and the Labour Advisory Board agreed to extend government coverage to include mesothelioma under the re-titledPneumoconiosis and Mesothelioma (Compensation) Ordinance (2008). Despite this success, the HKWHC remained concerned about the hidden hazard posed byasbestos in 15,600 privately-owned buildings, many ofwhich were built during the era of high asbestos consump-

to raise asbestos awareness throughout the country. On International Workers Memorial Day 2009, the MTUC
launched a workers’ petition which called for the implementation of these measures. Despite the existence of legislation to minimize hazardous asbestos exposures [75],
there were little available data quantifying the health effects of asbestos use in Malaysia; as a result, Malaysianasbestos victims remained invisible [76]. There was nogovernment surveillance program and the reporting of asbestos-related disease by medical practitioners was rare
due to widespread ignorance. As part of its campaign, theMTUC was trying to generate greater asbestos awarenessthrough a variety of means including training, publicity,
meetings and the distribution of information to union
members, employers, government officials and medical
professionals. The speaker concluded with an affirmationof his organization’s position: “The MTUC will,” he said
“continue relentlessly with the campaign until the total
ban of asbestos comes into full force in Malaysia.”
There were many questions asked and comments madeduring the final segment of this plenary session which revealed:Ŷ the key role NGOs and victims’ groups had to play inmobilizing support for asbestos bans;Ŷ the overwhelming lack of the medical expertise, dia-tion [72]. Pictures shown by the speaker revealed the ubiquity of such constructions and the presence ofdeteriorating asbestos-cement materials.
A sample taken from a commercial center in Kowloon on
March 19, 2009 tested positive for the presence of chrysotile. At a press conference (March 27, 2009) to announce
the findings, the HKWHC’s concerns were expressed, andspecific recommendations were made as to how the government might address the myriad of problems arising from asbestos in old buildings. In late 2009, the HK government
will start a project along these lines.
The title of the presentation by Matdiah Bin Mohammad[73], Banning Asbestos in Malaysia, underlined the factthat the Malaysian Trades Union Congress (MTUC) advocated the prohibition of asbestos [74]. As well as lobbying
for a national ban, the MTUC supported the use of safer
substitutes, a just transition for workers, enforcement of occupational safety and health laws and a coordinated effort

26

gnostic skills and equipment needed to diagnose asbestos-related disease;Ŷ the failure of medical specialists and academic researchers to bridge the divide between higher learningand workers’ needs; “there’s a huge gap between thestate-of-the-art research being done and what workers
have on the ground level”;
Ŷ the urgent need to collect core data on the incidenceof disease; in the vacuum created by lack of government action, victims’ groups should document the injured;Ŷ the need to help government officials, such as someencountered in Indonesia, who were prevented fromtaking action on the asbestos hazard by bureaucratic
obstacles; trade unions and community organizations
could play a useful role in helping them overcome
these and other challenges;
Ŷ that the struggle to ban asbestos had to be fought collectively on many fronts.
A delegate from the New Trade Union Initiative expressed
the feelings of many of those present when she said:“In India, state hospitals and clinics exist in hollow
structures without facilities and basic medicine. Workers have to fight to get these centers to work forthem… it’s a political fight to get your health care;it’s a political battle for the workers and victims to get
the correct kind of medical expertise into these areas
to identify their disease and get compensation… It’s apolitical battle to change the rules of the game.”Plenary Session 4

Meeting the Needs of Asbestos Victims
Moderator: Sugio Furuya

Asbestos victims have many pressing needs caused bytheir symptoms, their incapacity to work and the marginalization which their illnesses bring them and their families.
In most Asian countries, asbestos victims remain invisible
and uncompensated; few of the injured have their occupational illness recognized and even fewer receive compensation. The purpose of this session was to provide a platform
for victims to voice their experiences and indicate ways inwhich sufferers could be supported.
One of the most efficient means of delivering compensation to asbestos victims is to be found in New South
Wales, Australia where the Dust Diseases Tribunal (DDT)
fast-tracks asbestos litigation. Judge John O’Meally, President of the DDT, told delegates:“The Tribunal sits at any hour on any day at any place
to receive evidence from plaintiffs too ill to travel. Bedside hearings for plaintiffs who are terminally ill arealso common. The legal practitioners in the Tribunal
are generally skilled and experienced in handling asbestos cases. Sometimes there are cases with less than 4hours between (the) filing of a statement of a case anda conclusion.”
In order to streamline the legal process, the DDT had adopted some unusual rules:Ŷ while the Tribunal could reconsider any matter, rulesof evidence might be dispensed with for mattersdeemed not to be in genuine dispute or which mightcause expense and delay;Ŷ if a party refused or neglected to make an admission
on issues such as a diagnosis, when this had been established by evidence, cost penalties applied;Ŷ historical evidence and general medical evidence given in one case might be used for another;Ŷ issues of a general nature once determined, could not
be relitigated or reargued without the Tribunal’s leave;Ŷ there was no time limitation for bringing proceedings.
The grief and anger experienced by those who have lost a
loved one to asbestos motivates many campaigners now
working on behalf of victims. In her comments to the plenary session, Kazumi Yoshizaki [77] eloquently explained
the impact her Father’s suffering had on the family; thedepth of her loss fueled her determination to see a worldwide asbestos ban and to help others for whom any ban
would be too late. In Japan, she said, victims had been at
the forefront of a national asbestos campaign, led by theJapan Association of Mesothelioma and Asbestos-relatedDisease Victims and their Families. This group was founded in February 2004 as a result of the initial contact
between two asbestos widows brought together by suffering and loneliness. Reaching out to others in similar situations, they realized the comfort which could be drawn
from sharing their experiences and the improvements
which could be gained for victims by raising awareness ofthe national asbestos epidemic. The Association – which
now had 11 branches nationwide – was made up of patients suffering from asbestos-related cancers and respiratory diseases and family members who continued tosupport each other, lobby government for better medicalcare and financial support and educate the public about

Park Young Gu speaking and,from the left, Kazumi Yoshizaki,
Ahn Jong Joo and Sugio Furuya

27

Plenary Session 4
the reality of the asbestos tsunami which was engulfing
the country. The Association had played a leading role inmajor asbestos events such as:Ŷ the Global Asbestos Congress in Tokyo 2004;
Ŷ BANJAN mass meetings and protests in Tokyo 2006
& 2009;Ŷ workshops and conferences with Korean victims inTokyo, Seoul and Busan 2007 & 2008;

Ŷ the International Conference on Mesothelioma in São
Paulo, Brazil 2008.
In Japan, the mobilization of the victims had made the asbestos issue front page news and ended the invisibility ofthe suffering caused by occupational and environmental exposures to asbestos.

Among his co-workers, 33 died before the age of60, including his wife. Among the living, 27,
including Mr. Gu, had contracted asbestos-related
illnesses.
The comprehension of the impact asbestos has had in
Korea is a recent phenomenon which has been spurred by
the work undertaken by asbestos victims. The next two
speakers, members of Ban Asbestos Korea (BANKO), described the tragic human consequences and the steps taken
to raise public awareness of the hazard.
Park Young Gu worked in the Jeil Asbestos Textile Company from 1970 to 1978; this company was founded in1970 by Japanese investors who transferred asbestos production to Indonesia in the 1990s. At the Jeil factory in
Busan where the speaker worked:

Launch of "baby powder hotline" by KFEM
Among his co-workers, 33 died before the age of 60, including his wife. Among the living, 27, including Mr. Gu,
had contracted asbestos-related illnesses. Residents who
lived near the Jeil asbestos factory had died from the asbestos cancer, mesothelioma as had others who lived near
the sites of renovation projects and asbestos mines. The
number of Korea’s asbestos victims was increasing.
Sometimes a subject grabs the public imagination andcatapults an issue out of obscurity and into the forefrontof the national debate. Such were the reverberations of the"Asbestos Baby Powder Shock" in Korea which generated
masses of media coverage after a TV program announced
that baby powder marketed in Korea was contaminatedwith asbestos [78]. Describing the explosive effect this discovery had, speaker Ahn Jong Joo detailed the timeline
for the unfolding of this scandal:Ŷ March 30, 2009: Consumer Report program titled“There was so much dust I could not even see. At first
we just got work clothes and simple masks. There wasno dining hall, we had to carry our own lunch to theworkplace…. During break time or night shift, weeven slept on the asbestos sheets that we made.”Interjection by Japanese victims' representative,
Mrs. Kazuko Furukawa

28

Shocking! – Asbestos Detection in Baby Powder wasaired [79];Ŷ April 1, 2009: The Korean Food and Drug Administration (KFDA) held a press conference and issued apress release confirming the import of contaminatedtalc from China and ordered an immediate recall andban of a number of products;
Ŷ April 1: Baby Powder Scandal was the top item in theevening news;
Ŷ April 2: Baby Powder hotline opened by the Korean
Federation of the Environment Movement (KFEM),
the most influential NGO in Korea;
Ŷ April 2: Baby Powder Scandal was the top item in themorning news;
Ŷ April 2: the KFEM demonstrated in front of the
KFDA headquarters, demanding an apology from
Boryung Medical Company, a seller of the contaminated baby powder;Ŷ April 1-22, the scandal featured on major TV programs and in daily newspapers;Ŷ April 9: the KFDA prohibited the manufacture andsale of 5 cosmetic products containing asbestos talc

and unveiled a list of 1,122 medicines containing talc
which were banned [80];Ŷ April 16: the KFDA announced it would prosecute theCEO of Duksan Pure Chemicals.
Summarizing the outcome of the baby powder scandal in
Korea, the speaker said that it had awakened consumerawareness of the asbestos risk, publicized the national ban
and forced the government to declare a zero asbestos standard in baby powder, cosmetics and pharmaceuticals. The
role of the media in disseminating news of this scandal
had been crucial.

never received any protective equipment or training. Describing everyday work tasks, Mr. Chan Tong said: “I always had to fix the pipes by hand… I slipped between the
boilers. Of course I could easily inhale asbestos dust.” Mr.
Lai Cheong Fook, who had worked in a factory making asbestos-cement products, said:“I worked in a rural suburban area. We did not haveequipment like masks. I worked for two decades fromthe 1960s to 1980s. We had no protection at all. I'd befacing upwards with an electric drill, of course withlots of dust. Not even gloves. We must have inhaled a
lot of dust… We drilled holes, 'eating' the dust fallingfrom the roof every day. All our hands were dusty. We
even didn't have a piece of towel.”

Panel Discussion
The voice of the victims was clearly heard during the panel discussion moderated by Chan Kam-hong, the Chief Executive of the Association for the Rights of Industrial
Accident Victims (ARIAV), which featured contributions
from four Hong Kong asbestos victims who spoke of hazardous exposures in the shipyard and construction industries [81]. While Mr. Leung Kam On recalled theprovision of “basic and simple protective equipment suchas masks,” he still became covered in dust during the workday. Shipyard workers Tang Chun Shing and Chan Tong
were never told of the risks of working with asbestos and

The health of each of the participants had been affected bytheir illnesses; typical symptoms included loss of lungfunction, prolonged bouts of coughing and difficulty inwalking. The perseverance of these sufferers and otherHong Kong workers similarly affected had been the driving force behind the campaigning work of ARIAV. In
1993, a major shift in government pneumoconiosis policy
was brought about when one-off lump sum payments
were replaced by a monthly compensation payout; in addition, the government now pays the bills for medical treatment and rehabilitation services [82].

Hong Kong asbestos victims with Chan Kam-hong (center)

29

Workshop 4International Transfer of Asbestos Industry to Asian Locations
Moderator: Barry Castleman

For more than one hundred years, the asbestos industry
has been conducted on a global scale. European and American asbestos manufacturers bought asbestos mines inAfrica and Canada, operated cartels to fix prices and divided worldwide markets. Research discussed in the Case
Report of the International Trade of the Asbestos Industry in Asia by Professor Takehiko Murayama indicatedthat Japanese asbestos companies also took a long-term
pan-national strategic approach to asbestos manufacturing
which encouraged overseas diversification, increasing contact with major foreign competitors [83] and the transferof hazardous technology to less developed countries [84].
Japanese investment in companies which were presumed
to use asbestos in developing countries rose consistently
between 1969 and 2001; even as mobilization of the ban asbestos movement was gathering pace in Japan, there was arecord number of overseas asbestos investments [85].
Recent visits by Korean and Japanese researchers to
Korean-owned asbestos production units in Indonesia revealed that the dumping of hazardous production was continuing and that the same asbestos technology which had
been used first in Japanese and then in Korean factories
had been exported to Indonesia; people in Jakarta reported
that machinery from Jeil Asbestos was being sent toChina. Accompanying the transfer of asbestos production

Joint research team, Indonesia, August 200830

was the transfer of risks to workers and residents living inproximity to factories which had standards of occupational safety and health approximating Japan’s in the 1960s
and Korea’s in the 1970s. A diagram illustrating the typical national process of going from asbestos use to asbestos
ban was exhibited by the speaker, who urged governments
to accept the responsibility of intervening in the time-consuming process and prevent the international transfer of
the asbestos hazard by banning asbestos.
Dr. Dong-Mug Kang, Dr. Zulmiar Yanri and Yeyong Choi,members of the same research team as the previous speaker, provided more information on the findings. In thepresentation Joint Case Study: Exposure Survey of Nichias [86] Textile Factories in Japan, Korea and Indonesia,
Dr. Kang, from the Korea Research Center for AsbestosRelated Diseases, School of Medicine, Pusan National
University, detailed a field study carried out on August 2628, 2008 in Cibinong, Bogor, Indonesia to assess current
occupational exposure levels and environmental exposures outside the premises of an asbestos factory which
was consuming 612 kilograms/day of asbestos. Mean airborne asbestos levels associated with production processes were: 8.6 f/cc mixing, 7.3 f/cc carding, 7.5 f/cc
spinning, 3.9 f/cc twisting, 3.1 f/cc weaving and 4.3 f/cc
winding [87], while average asbestos concentrations forWorkshop 4
personal and regional air monitoring were 5.7 f/cc and 2.4
f/cc, respectively. Asbestos was identified in soil samples
within 100 meters of the factory while 5 meters from thefactory the distribution of airborne asbestos varied from
0.154 f/cc to the south, 0.067 f/cc to the west, 0.016 f/cc to
the east and 0.001 f/cc to the north [88]. These differenceswere explained by the prevalence of a northeast wind. As
there was no legislation regulating hazardous asbestos exposures in Indonesia, the research findings showing substantial occupational and environmental exposure
generated by this factory were grounds for concern.
Dr. Zulmiar Yanri from the National Occupational Safety
and Health Center, Indonesia discussed the results of lungfunction and chest X-rays taken from at-risk individuals in
Cibinong [89]. Out of a total of 265 workers, 101 (38%)
were tested; of the 50,000 people living within 500 metersof the factory, 95 were examined. The results were as follows:Ŷ high levels of lung abnormalities were detectedamong the asbestos workers and local residents whichmight have been caused by asbestos exposure; among
these subjects, the levels of diagnosed lung disease
were 100 times the national average!

Ŷ 43% of workers with more than 11 years of employment had lung abnormalities; workers in the warehouse and mixing department were at highest risk[90];
Ŷ the results of spirometric testing showed that 56% of
the residents had lung abnormalities; community
members had a higher rate than workers!
To clarify these results, further research was needed.
Yeyong Choi of the Citizens' Institute for Environmental
Studies and the Ban Asbestos Network Korea discussed
the background to the project and its sociological findings
in his paper: Dangerous Trades, Dangerous Neighborhood. The 21+ members of the project staff came from Indonesia, Japan and Korea and included 10 doctors (someof whom worked for the government), six academics,
three journalists and two environmentalists. As well as conducting air monitoring, soil testing and medical examinations, research efforts in 2008 included interviews withkey personnel including:Ŷ factory workers who confirmed the hazardous conditions which existed at the worksite and the lack of personal protective equipment, engineering controls andmedical check-ups; the abysmal state of the workplace
was confirmed by direct observation;
Ŷ Takeshi Sugihara, President of P. T. Nichias Rockwool
Indonesia who said that since March 2007, Nichias
had stopped using asbestos following a decision taken
at Nichias headquarters;
Ŷ staff at the nearest private hospital to the Cibinong asbestos factory (RS. Bina Husada); they knew nothing

Asbestos textile production at PT Jeil Fajar factory
about the local asbestos textile factories and nothing
about asbestos-related diseases;Ŷ staff at the nearest public hospital (Badan Rumahsakitdaerah Cibinong); they also knew nothing about the
local asbestos textile factories and nothing about asbestos-related diseases. They agreed that asbestos education was a priority not only for hospital staff but
also for local government officials.
Having detailed the extensive efforts that had been madeto track the spread of the asbestos industry throughout

Schoolday exposures to Nichias asbestos experienced by Japanese children in the cities of Naraand Korean children in Busan had resulted inhigh levels of illness …
Asia, the speaker showed a photograph of an Indonesian
worker holding a baby; the worker was wearing a blue
work shirt with the PT Jeil Fajar logo. Not only was thechild being exposed to his father’s contaminated work
clothes but he – like 50,000 other people – was being exposed to the high levels of asbestos permeating the neighborhood [91]. Within 500 meters of the PT Jeil Fajar
asbestos factory were many schools: 12 kindergartens, 12elementary schools, 7 middle schools and 7 high schools– a total of 10,000 students. It was not known how many
more schools were within 2 kilometers. Schoolday exposures to Nichias asbestos experienced by Japanese children
in the cities of Nara and Korean children in Busan had resulted in high levels of illness; in decades to come, Indonesian children in Cibinong would be similarly affected.
Although international organizations, regional bodies andnational governments had important roles to play in ending Asian asbestos trafficking, the results of this collaborative research project showed what could be achieved
when asbestos victims, environmental activists and tradeunionists worked together.
Considering the ubiquity of asbestos use throughout Asiaand the fact that Brazil is one of the world’s biggest producers, there could be little doubt that Brazilian exports
would find their way to Asian countries. Data quantifying

31

illegal; the export of this cargo was blocked. Other asbestos shipments awaiting dispatch at the port – one of which
was destined for India – were discovered by port authority
officials and customs agents; these shipments were also
embargoed. A stalemate had been reached; 5,000 tons ofasbestos at the docks could not be exported and the supplier – the SAMA chrysotile mine – did not want the asbestos back. The blacklisted shipments were currently taking
up valuable space in the customs agents’ yards. To return
the asbestos to the mine would take 200 trucks 32 hours
by road; an escort team would be required to see the convoy to the state border as asbestos was classified as a dangerous and prohibited material. Another option was todump the embargoed material in landfills for dangerous
waste, but these disposal sites were far away and expensive. For the time being, the impasse remained.

Inspecting an illegal asbestos shipment, Brazil
this toxic trade were included in Engineer Fernanda Giannasi’s presentation Brazilian Asbestos Exports to Asia[92]. Brazil was, the speaker confirmed, the world’s 4thlargest asbestos producer, a major exporter and a big consumer. The multinational companies that owned the asbestos business in Brazil for more than 50 years sold theirinterests to national businessmen who were engaged in aruthless and aggressive campaign to silence opponents andprotect domestic markets. Despite their best efforts, annual
asbestos consumption in Brazil had been declining. In order to compensate for lost domestic sales, the Brazilian asbestos lobby had worked closely with other stakeholders
to target markets in developing countries. Following theprecedent set by Canada, Brazil was exporting increasing
amounts of its annual production; 65-70% (~290,000 tons)of exports were being sold to Asian and Latin Americancountries, most of which had few, if any, health and safety
regulations. According to government data, 74% of raw asbestos fiber exports went to Asia; shipments to Thailand,Brazil’s biggest overseas customer, accounted for 25% of
all sales, with other exports going to India (23%), Indonesia (17%), Iran (7%), Malaysia and Sri Lanka [93]. The
fact that asbestos vested interests had defeated the categorization of chrysotile as a hazardous substance under the
Rotterdam Convention meant that these exports were being sent without any prior informed consent notification.

an escort team would be required to see the convoy to the state border as asbestos was classified
as a dangerous and prohibited material.
Under Brazilian asbestos labor regulations, manufacturers
must notify the government about asbestos use, trade, transport and production. An investigation by the Labor Ministry revealed that a company which had been registeredas producing asbestos-cement flowerpots was involved inexporting raw fiber to Asia from a port in São Paulo State.
The fact that there was now a statewide asbestos ban inSão Paulo meant that the transit of this shipment throughthe state to the port as well as the export of this cargo were32

As was discussed by other speakers at the conference,
multinational corporations have been responsible for negligent asbestos exposures not only in their home countries
but also overseas. A recent test case has succeeded on behalf of an Australian resident employed by a New Zealandbased company; exposure to asbestos was alleged by theemployee during business trips to Europe and Asia. The
defendant’s application that Victoria was not the appropriate forum for such a claim was rejected. Australian Lawyer Maria McGarvie, said that despite the very unusual
facts of the case, it might prove relevant to other non-Australian asbestos victims. In the presentation Asbestos
Claims against an Australian Multinational – TheJames Hardie Experience, the speaker explained that the
Puttick case would have limited application for Asian asbestos victims who worked for the Australian asbestos giant James Hardie at one of its Asian subsidiaries [94].
Whilst employed by the Fletcher company (1981-1989),
Mr. Puttick was sent to visit asbestos factories in Belgium
and Malaysia [95]. In 2001, he and his family moved
from New Zealand to Victoria, Australia where he later
contracted mesothelioma. Upon his death in 2005, thecase was continued on behalf of his wife and surviving
children. The Supreme Court and the Victorian Court ofAppeal found that Victoria was “ a clearly inappropriate
forum” and stayed the proceedings. On November 12,
2008, the High Court of Australia reversed this finding ina unanimous decision. The High Court decision had allowed the Plaintiff, the widow and children of the late Mr.
Puttick, to proceed with their substantive case for damages. This case was now proceeding before the Supreme
Court of Victoria and given the procedural and factual peculiarities of the case it might be some time before it
reached its final conclusion. Considering the widespreaduse of asbestos in Asia and the etiology of asbestos-related diseases, there was little doubt that the incidence of
these diseases would rise throughout the region. Potential
claimants in Australia might now be able to successfully
pursue claims in this jurisdiction against defendants responsible for negligent foreign exposures.

Workshop 5

Shipyards, Ship-breaking Industry and Railways
Moderator: Paul Bastian

There were, said the first speaker in this session, about
60,000 Indian workers in the ship-breaking yards who
lived in abject poverty and suffered all the consequences associated with financial deprivation including poor health,lack of access to clean water and medical care, and exploitation. Having visited a Mumbai ship-breaking yard, ateam of the International Metalworkers Federation (IMF)
resolved to put into practice a 1997 IMF resolution to organize the unorganized. The IMF’s General Secretary Marcello Malentacchi explained the urgent need to:“gather information on the working conditions of the
shipbreaking workers in Mumbai and Alang, regarding wages, working and living conditions, migrationand the economic status of workers… the shipbreaking workers have never had any organization or voice
to speak up for them and defend their most basic
rights. There is no legislation directly covering the industry which means no protection whatsoever for theworkers and very little information available about
working conditions.”[96]In the presentation Organizing Migrant Shipbreaking
Workers in India, by Sudhershan Rao Sarde, an IMF representative from the South Asia Region, the speaker delineated the phased approach which the IMF team put into
place which began with providing water, ambulance services and first-aid boxes. Having gained the workers’
trust, the next steps were to conduct a blood donation
camp, issue identity cards and offer reduced rate subscription for ship-breaking workers [97]. Mohalla (Neighborhood) Committees, which were formed to help integratemigrant workers into civil society, created a sense of confidence and security for the workers. The news of this pioneering initiative spread to Alang.
The IMF’s work was not warmly received by all stakeholders; there was stiff resistance from employers,
moneylenders and local mafia. These obstacles were overcome and the Alang Sosiya Ship Recycling and General
Workers Association – the only union for ship-breaking
workers in India – was registered. This body conducted asurvey on the socio-economic conditions of migrant workers which identified linguistic and cultural challenges andestablished that 96% of the workers were internal migrants
from economically backward states of India. Following
the submission of this research to the Supreme Court of India, a Monitoring Committee was appointed to study theconditions in the ship-breaking yards. On March 23-24,
2009, 20,000 ship-breaking workers at Alang went on
strike; the strike, led by the Alang Sosiya Ship Recycling
and General Workers Association, was successful.

Report of Malignant Mesothelioma Caused by Occupational Exposure to Asbestos in Taiwan Shipyards was the
subject of the next presentation which was given by a representative of the Taiwan Association for Victims of Occupational Injuries (TAVOI). Between 1967 and 1995,
asbestos victim Mr. Lee worked in the Keeulung Shipyard
operated by the China Shipbuilding Corporation of
Taiwan. He undertook installation work and seam weldingof pipelines; these jobs would have brought Mr. Lee into
contact with asbestos which the shipyard admited it had
used in insulation materials. In 2007, more than a decade
after he retired, Mr. Lee was diagnosed with mesothelioma; he died shortly thereafter. The family was informed
by a doctor that the death had probably been caused bywork; a case was put to the city government requesting arbitration with the employer on the subject of compensation. TAVOI staff helped the Lees obtain a diagnosis
certificate from the Occupational Disease Certification
Committee and armed with this they were fighting forcompensation. The second case discussed related to Mr.
Siu who had worked for 23 years in the Cijin Military
Shipyard of Kaohsiung in Taiwan as a ship repairer. Aftersuffering a heart attack in 2006, he was diagnosed withmesothelioma; in 2007, his condition was certified as an
occupational illness.
The situation in the Taiwan shipyards was put into perspective by the next presentation, Shipbuilding and Mesothelioma in Europe and in Asia, by Dr. Claudio Bianchi
from the Center for the Study of Environmental Cancer,
Italian League against Cancer, Hospital of Monfalcone,
Monfalcone, Italy. The speaker, having detailed the history of the Italian shipyard industry, described the consequences for Italian shipyard workers of theiroccupational asbestos exposures. Anecdotal evidence,
backed up by scientific and epidemiological data, revealeda strong relationship between shipbuilding and mesothelioma. A review of 451 cases of malignant mesotheliomaof the pleura, diagnosed in 1968-2008 among shipyard
workers in the Trieste–Monfalcone area, northeastern
Italy, showed the following:Ŷ the mean and median ages of the patients were 68.9
and 69.0 years, respectively;

Ŷ about 75% of the patients had been employed in the
shipyards for more than 20 years;

Ŷ in 104 cases, asbestos bodies were isolated after chemical digestion of lung tissue; 53% showed more than
10,000 bodies per gram of dry tissue;
Ŷ more than 65% of patients received their first
shipyard asbestos exposures before 1950, 12% in the
1960s and 3.5% in the 1970s;

33Workshop 5
Ŷ the lag between asbestos exposures and the manifestation of disease ranged from 14-72 years; in the vast
majority of cases, latency periods were more than 40
years.
Graphs shown illustrated the concurrent decline inEuropean ship production and the rise in Asian ship produc-

The experience of workers from the Trieste–
Monfalcone shipyards suggested that amesothelioma epidemic would occur due tooccupational exposures at the big shipyards
in Eastern Asia in the coming decades.
tion between 1955 and 1971; despite fluctuations in demand from 1981 to 1990, Japan and South Korea became
world leaders in ship construction. The experience of workers from the Trieste–Monfalcone shipyards suggested thata mesothelioma epidemic would occur due to occupational
exposures at the big shipyards in Eastern Asia in the coming decades.
Given the widespread usage of asbestos in transportation infrastructure, the contamination of older European railway
vehicles is a common occurrence. How countries whichhave banned asbestos deal with this contamination highlights the existence of accepted clean-up measures which
minimize occupational hazards. In his presentation, Heinz

The contaminated dump is first sealed.

34

Access tunnel for clearance of contaminated waste.
Kropiunik quantified the problem in Austria, showed photographs of faulty working practices and explained a decontamination program which safely removed hugequantities of asbestos-containing material (ACM) fromhundreds of Austrian rail vehicles. According to available
estimates, a typical Austrian rail vehicle built during the
1960s-1970s could contain between 40 and 80 kilogramsof ACMs; these products were used for acoustic, thermaland electrical insulation and fireproofing. Common ACMs
in railway vehicles included sprayed-on asbestos insulation, which was extremely friable and had a high asbestos
content, panels, ropes and boards.
According to Austrian law, after rail vehicles reached theend of their working lives they could be scrapped, but
only after all ACMs had been professionally removed.
About 10 years ago, the Austrian Federal Railways sold
400 rail vehicles to a private company which scrapped
them over 3-4 years without taking any notice of the asbestos contamination which was present. The ACMs andother hazardous materials were dumped illegally; the contaminated debris – about 8,500 m³, containing 20+ tonsof asbestos – formed two huge mounds. In 2004, local authorities as well as the media became aware of this problem. The private company which did the illegal scrappingof the rail vehicles was obliged to remove the waste
dumped on the hillsides. A plan devised by the speakerand his team to remove the debris was approved by the
local authorities; work began in March 2009 and wasscheduled to take 30 workers 3 months to complete.

Plenary Session 5

Building the Global Ban Asbestos Network
Moderator: Laurie Kazan-AllenIn the presentation Social Movements in South America:
The Role Performed by Social Movements and Activists
against the Asbestos Industrial Lobby which began the
penultimate session of the conference, Engineer Fernanda
Giannasi put the struggle to ban asbestos within a politicalas well as a sociological context:“The boom of asbestos production and use in SouthAmerica coincided with a time of non-democratic governments. During the 20 years of military dictatorships in Brazil, Peru, Chile and Argentina, the use ofasbestos flourished; the restoration of the democratic
process marked a turning point for this industry as theuse of asbestos is incompatible with democratic goals
and human rights.”
In October 2005, the French Senate issued an official report which denounced the Government, the asbestos industry and trade unions for allowing the continued use ofasbestos, an acknowledged carcinogen. The Senate, which
described the French asbestos epidemic as the worst occupational health catastrophe of the twentieth century, accused the Government of having been anesthetized by theasbestos lobby. “It was,” said the speaker “a perfect social
crime as it allowed the maximization of corporate profits
and the socialization of cancer despair.”In recent years, asbestos bans had been achieved in Argentina, Chile, Uruguay, four Brazilian states and several
Brazilian municipalities. In many South American countries, victims’ groups such as the Brazilian Association of
the Asbestos-Exposed (ABREA) had played a prominentrole in formulating national asbestos debates by positioning themselves as counterpowers to the industrial might ofasbestos stakeholders [98]. Since it was founded in 1995,

Sunday in the park with ABREA

ABREA had disseminated information on asbestos risks,
campaigned for local, regional and national legislation toban asbestos, engaged in capacity building, lobbied for social protection, medical assistance and compensation fortaking on a politically powerful and wellresourced industry in a country the size of Brazil
had necessitated the total commitment andenergy of the ABREA community …
victims as well as the rehabilitation of damaged mining
areas. It had uncovered and publicized the asbestos industry’s dirty tricks, exposed false data and lies asbestos
stakeholders had used to influence public opinion, denounced noncompliance with environmental regulations
and publicized health and safety infringements.
ABREA had organized 10 victims’ groups in 7 states; themembership of these groups are listed below:

Ŷ Bahia: former workers from Sama (Poções) and
Eternit (Simões Filho);Ŷ Rio de Janeiro: former workers from Asberit (Rio deJaneiro);Ŷ São Paulo: former workers from Brasilit and SaintGobain (São Caetano do Sul), Eternit (Osasco) andAvibras (Jacareí);Ŷ Paraná: former workers from Multilit (São José dos
Pinhais);Ŷ Goiás: former workers from Sama (Minaçu);
Ŷ Minas Gerais: former workers from Brasilit and SaintGobain (Contagem);Ŷ Pernambuco: former workers from Brasilit.
The logistical and financial challenges which had been
overcome were monumental; taking on a politicallypowerful and well-resourced industry in a country the sizeof Brazil had necessitated the total commitment and energy of the ABREA community as well as the support ofcampaigners representing other disadvantaged organizedgroups such as the landless, the disabled and the homeless. While the success of the Latin America Virtual Citizens’ Ban Asbestos Network could be measured in lives
saved, the ineffectiveness of international agencies, the inactivity of governmental bodies and the apathy of some
big non-governmental organizations remained a grave disappointment.
Dr. Annie Thébaud-Mony, the Director of Research at the
French Institute of Health and Medical Research and afounding member of Ban Asbestos France, has been involved in the ban asbestos campaign for more than twenty

35Plenary Session 5
years as both an academic and a concerned citizen. In her
paper on The Mobilization of European Action on Asbestos: the Ban Asbestos Network, she touched on the originsof the movement in France, early attempts at cross-bordercollaboration and the efforts required to move the campaign from the radical fringe to mainstream society. The
evolution of the Ban Asbestos Network (BAN) was informative as it highlighted key issues such as the difficulties of
pre-internet communication, the dispute which took place
within the scientific community about the toxicity of asbestos, the political and economic influence of the asbestos industry and the double standards applied by multinationals
to excuse dangerous operations in developing countries; italso showed the emerging power of the social forces
which coalesced over the need to ban the use of asbestos
and obtain justice for the injured.
In the mid-1970s, scientists at a university in Paris discovered that their experiments were being contaminatedby a white dust: asbestos. The scientists made common
cause with asbestos textile workers and students to protest
the hazardous exposures generated by the increasing useof asbestos. French activists and academics met with ahandful of other European campaigners in Strasbourg(1991 & 1992) and in Milan (1993); these meetings laid
the foundation for the Ban Asbestos Network (BAN). As
discussions proceeded, the deadly impact asbestos was having on populations throughout Europe became irrefutable.
In 1994, BAN members participated in a seminar in São
Paulo, Asbestos: Controlled Use or Ban, to share data andexperiences; with the new members from Brazil, BAN became a global citizens’ network. Since its inception, BAN
had been unique; there were no premises, no hierarchy andno official representatives. The thousands of people participating in the worldwide ban asbestos community werevictims, campaigners, environmentalists, trade unionists,
medical specialists, concerned citizens, civil servants,
journalists, lawyers and politicians.
As the campaign became a global phenomenon, it became
clear that a permanent body was needed to service theneeds of the movement; the International Ban Asbestos Sec-

retariat was set up in 1999. Joint initiatives mounted bythis network had had a major impact on the worldwide debate on banning the use of asbestos. They included the:Ŷ Global Asbestos Congress, Osasco, Brazil 2000;
Ŷ European Asbestos Seminar, Brussels, Belgium 2001;
Ŷ Canadian Asbestos: A Global Concern, Ottawa,
Canada 2003;

Ŷ Global Asbestos Congress, Tokyo, Japan 2004;
Ŷ international protests in France, Egypt and India oversending a French naval flagship, the Clemenceau, toIndia for dismantling 2005-2006.
In its pursuit of justice for the injured, BAN had supported the legal efforts of South African asbestos victims intheir action against the UK company Cape Asbestos and
Italian asbestos victims in their ongoing case against
Swiss Eternit executives who, it is alleged, were responsible for the negligent operations of the asbestos-cement
factories in Casale Monferrato and other Italian towns.
Concluding her talk, the speaker called for the establishment of an International Criminal Court of Labor to ensure that those responsible for the global asbestos
catastrophe were held to account. “Asbestos cases could,”
she concluded “become a precedent for other cases ofcriminal negligence arising from occupational and environmental damage done by hazardous exposures.”
Speaking about the work of the Ban Asbestos Network of
Korea (BANKO), Yeyong Choi, a member of BANKO
and the Korean Federation of the Environment Movement, said: “Although BANKO was launched only 10
months ago, it feels like 10 years have already passed. I
feel as if I am running in a minefield full of asbestos
bombs.” His presentation began with the showing of avideo shot two weeks previously at a demolition site in
downtown Seoul; although the contractors said that they
had “safely handled the asbestos,” nobody believed them.
This was the reality in Korea nowadays; even where regulations to prevent harmful exposures existed, they were
not enforced.
A flow chart documenting asbestos problems in Korea indicated that as a result of asbestos mining, manufacturing,consumption and disposal which had polluted mine sites,industrial areas, local communities and the environment,
all sectors of the Korean population had been exposed.
Photographs shown by the speaker highlighted typicalsites where pollution had been found:Ŷ two large quarries and a residential area located nearan asbestos mine [99];Ŷ homes near a large-scale housing reconstruction project;Ŷ residential areas in close proximity to asbestos textile
factories in Busan [100];

GAC 2004: the highly effective support team36

Ŷ Samsung’s Seoul headquarters, currently being renovated and decontaminated. BANKO air monitoring de-the presentation Building a Grass-roots Asbestos Victims’
Organization in North America, Linda Reinstein,
ADAO’s Executive Director and Co-Founder, described
the steps taken to create a body representing “the voice ofthe victims” which could engage constructively in the national asbestos debate; a twenty-first century communication strategy was needed to educate the public andacquaint politicians with the harsh reality faced by injured
Americans in a country where the use of this acknowledged carcinogen remained legal:

BANKO members demonstrate with BANJAN
outside Nichias premises at Oji, Japan.
tected the presence of crocidolite (blue) asbestos; subsequent measurements taken by the Ministry of Labor
verified these findings. Samsung denied the contamination;Ŷ schools and quarries polluted by tremolite asbestos[101];
Ŷ subway line 2 in the Seoul underground system whichcontained sprayed asbestos products.
The results of these and other exposures were predictable.
Based on the amount of asbestos used, it had been
estimated that as many as 35,000 Koreans could havecontracted an asbestos-related cancer, and more than 9000
asbestosis, up to 2003.
BANKO members had pressed the government and public
to confront the country’s asbestos reality, often employing
imaginative and eye-catching techniques to stimulate media interest. Demonstrations had been held in front of government buildings (2007), at the Tokyo headquarters of theJapanese asbestos multinational Nichias (2008), in the
Seoul subway (2008), outside an illegal factory in Busan(2008), in downtown Seoul (2008), in Yangsan (2008) andin front of Parliament (2009). Last year BANKO participated in a public seminar in Parliament to consider a new asbestos law and continued its involvement with ongoing
research to establish levels of asbestos contamination in
Cibinong, Indonesia. This year BANKO members helped
establish the presence of asbestos contamination in Taiwan
and played a leading role in the publicity surrounding thebaby powder scandal in Korea. Paying tribute to BANKO
volunteers, the speaker acknowledged that the road ahead
was long but that “working together like brothers and sisters can make this hard work easier and help alleviate thesuffering of the victims.”
Over the last five years, asbestos activism in the UnitedStates has been reinvigorated by a body, led and run by volunteers, called the Asbestos Diseases Awareness Organization (ADAO) [102]. ADAO was founded by two families
affected by the fatal consequences of asbestos exposure. In“There is an art to effective messaging that makes anduses news to generate publicity. This includes press releases, newsletters, eBlasts, interviews and letters to
the Editor. What happens if your message falls on
deaf ears? For activists, we need to recognize the traditional media has changed. We need to use new media. It is an exciting equal-opportunity forum. Out of
the new media, you can choose facebook, twitter and
You Tube [103]. And it's really a level playing field. It
democratizes activism. All of these outlets are very
easy to use. They are dynamic, and most importantly,
they are free.”
The passion generated by so many personal tragedies motivated the work of thousands of ADAO members and inspired them to share resources, knowledge and experience
to help others. To be effective, the work of the volunteers
was coordinated as part of an overall plan with a mission

Recognizing that a major change in public
policy, such as the banning of asbestos, would
not happen overnight required a sustainablelevel of activity to keep the subject on thenational agenda …
statement, specified goals, consistent messaging, longterm relationships and innovative projects such as the
ADAO’s consumer product testing, ADAO T.V and National Asbestos Awareness Week [104]. Recognizing thata major change in public policy, such as the banning of asbestos, would not happen overnight required a sustainablelevel of activity to keep the subject on the national
agenda; working with like-minded groups in the U.S. andabroad maximized effectiveness. Concluding her talk, thespeaker paid tribute to those whose lives had been lost toasbestos and pledged that they would not be forgotten.
“In order to have a comprehensive ban on asbestos in
Asia, grass-roots strengthening is not only essential but
critical,” the next speaker said at the beginning of thepresentation: Grass-roots Strengthening and Building a
Grass-roots Asbestos Movement in Asia. Director of the
Asia Monitor Resource Center (AMRC) Sanjiv Pandita
detailed recent asbestos work undertaken by the AMRC including capacity building, training with labor and community groups, the production of basic literature andposters in local Asian languages and subregional and local

37

Plenary Session 5
needed to do all this urgently to prevent more lives being
lost. “Grass-roots [ban] asbestos organizing is essential
not only for its own sake but also because asbestos epitomized bigger problems embedded in Asia,” he said.

That multiple attempts to place chrysotile
asbestos on the Prior Informed Consent list of
this Convention had been blocked illustrated theruthless determination of asbestos-exporting
countries …

Sanjiv Pandita
meetings. Expressing his frustration at the industry myths
which continue to protect the image of asbestos in Asia, he
said:“It was easier for Bush to prove to the UN that Iraq
had weapons of mass destruction and lead a war thatkilled thousands than for us – even with so muchdamning scientific evidence from the ILO, WHO, andother reputable institutions – to get asbestos banned in
Asia. I think asbestos is the real weapon of mass destruction.”
There was a disconnect between asbestos bans adopted bydozens of governments to protect human life and the escalating use of asbestos throughout Asia. Workers in the region, which accounted for the majority of annual global
asbestos consumption, often experienced high levels of exposure, but because the substance “appeared” to be an innocuous white powder, and not a smelly chemical, they
did not perceive it as harmful. When told of the long-term
damage it could do, many Asian workers felt that the tradeoff between a job today and a premature death in 20+
years, was a good deal. There was a serious lack of communication between the ban asbestos movement and the shop
floor.
Where there was no diagnosis of asbestos illness, there
could be no compensation. Throughout Asia, it was rare
for occupational respiratory illness to be diagnosed and anasbestos-injured patient who succeeded in getting medicalcare was more often than not misdiagnosed as sufferingfrom tuberculosis or some other condition due to the lackof even basic amenities like X-ray equipment and trained
doctors. Just because Asian asbestos victims were not recognized did not mean there were none; their invisibility
in national statistics was used by governments to justify
the status quo. In 2001, China reported 12,736 fatal accidents to the ILO, which was only 12% of the ILO’s estimate; India, a country of more than one billion people,
reported 222 cases, 0.55% of the ILO estimate. These numbers were nonsense, worse than that they were an insult tothose who had been injured. We had to build institutions at
grass-roots level, create asbestos awareness among workers and identify, empower and mobilize victims; and we

38

There was good news and bad news in the presentation Asbestos at the Rotterdam Convention and World Bank, byEnvironmental Consultant Dr. Barry Castleman. Dealing
with the bad news first, the speaker said that given all that
had been discovered about the asbestos hazard, it would
seem logical for its use to be regulated. An international
agreement – the Rotterdam Convention – existed which
could mandate that exporting nations advise consumer
countries of the risks involved with using hazardous substances; while this was not a ban, it would, at least, ensurethat potential consumers had the information necessary to
make an informed decision. That multiple attempts toplace chrysotile asbestos on the Prior Informed Consent
list of this Convention had been blocked illustrated theruthless determination of asbestos-exporting countries,
aided by the corruption of some asbestos-consuming countries, to continue the immoral trade in asbestos [105]. By
blocking action on chrysotile, vested interests had createdanarchy and confusion within the Convention which
threatened to compromise its very existence. There might
be a chance to change the voting rules so that a 2/3 majority would suffice instead of the current requirement for unanimous agreement.
The good news related to a new World Bank document:
Good Practice Note: Asbestos: Occupational andCommunity Health Issues [106] which:Ŷ urged avoidance of asbestos-containing materials(ACM) in new construction and new materials forrenovation;
Ŷ required asbestos management plans for existing structures with in-place ACM;
Ŷ mandated that the repair or removal and disposal ofexisting ACM should only be performed by speciallytrained personnel, following host country requirements, or in their absence, internationally recognizedprocedures.
Although adherence to this guidance note was discretionary, advice provided by the World Bank was usually regarded as a precedent for other development banks,
private banks and governments. The 17-page note explained the international consensus on phasing-out asbestos use, provided information on alternative building
products and included summaries and references on bestpractices for asbestos abatement.

Plenary Session 6

Going Forward: Consolidation and Closing Session
Moderator: Sanjiv Pandita

Having been circulated amongst the conference delegates
previously, the draft Hong Kong Declaration Towards a
Complete Ban on all forms of Asbestos (Appendix A) wastabled by Elizabeth Tang [107] who read out the text and incorporated revisions suggested from the floor. The declaration, having highlighted the growing use of asbestos in
Asia, industry’s aggressive marketing techniques and thethreat to occupational and public health, made a series of recommendations amongst which were:Ŷ an immediate and comprehensive ban on all forms ofasbestos and processes that involve asbestos including
mining, manufacturing or any other activity;
Ŷ the implementation of policies which encourage a justtransition to safer technologies;Ŷ setting up administrative protocols and diagnostic
infrastructures which recognize the injuries sustainedby victims and providing financial and medical
assistance;Ŷ holding companies involved in the export of asbestos
production to newly industrializing countries criminally liable in the country of origin and country ofoperation;
Ŷ the engagement by international agencies, regional
bodies and national governments with Asian asbestos
victims’ groups and the implementation of joint
initiatives to tackle harmful asbestos legacies.
Once the text was finalized and adopted by unanimous consent, it fell to Dr. Domyung Paek and Sugio Furuya to announce the launch of the Asian-Ban Asbestos Network(A-BAN). This news was greeted with a standing ovationby conference participants. The next item on the agenda
was the announcement of the winning submissions for
IBAS 2009 Grass-roots Bursaries; the successful projects
were:Ŷ from The People’s Training and Research Center, Bar-

Safety and Health Group of the Sedane Labor Resource Center, Indonesia which will track asbestos usage, raise public awareness of the asbestos hazard andempower affected workers and communities to contribute to the national asbestos debate.
The Henri Pezerat Memorial Award 2009 was presented
by Dr. Annie Thébaud-Mony to Dr. Domyung Paek in recognition of his research, leadership and commitment.
Like Henri, Domyung was, said Dr. Thébaud-Mony, a“Scientist-Activist” who did not let his training and education get in the way of his humanity. Like Henri, Domyung
had responded to the needs of individuals and communities polluted by asbestos and like Henri he had chosen adifficult road to navigate. Dr. Paek accepted the award on
behalf of all BANKO members and pledged to redouble
his efforts to work with colleagues to end Asia’s asbestos
plague.
Bringing the Asian Asbestos Conference 2009 to a close,
Apo Leong, of the Asia Monitor Resource Centre, reflected on the information which had been shared during theconference; stories from Japan, China, Korea, Brazil andelsewhere illustrated the tragic reality of the asbestos risk,a reality we ignored at our peril. Despite the steep learning curve faced by many AAC 2009 delegates new to thesubject of asbestos, there was a real determination
amongst them to turn what they had learned in Hong
Kong into action to raise asbestos awareness on the mainland. The speaker congratulated the delegates on the safedelivery of the new organization “A-BAN” and reminded
colleagues of the significance of April 28. “Tomorrow,”
he said “there will be demonstrations in downtown Hong
Kong which will mark International Workers Memorial
Day. All conference delegates are invited to take part in
the events planned to visualize the ongoing asbestos hazard faced daily by so many people in China, Asia andaround the world. Let us,” he concluded “work together
for a better tomorrow.”oda, Gujarat, India – to locate potential asbestos
claimants, file compensation claims,
identify medical contacts and local facilities, map polluted worksites and/or environmental contamination.
Ŷ from The Mine Labour Protection Campaign, Rajasthan, India – to address asbestos problems in the Udaipur district
where a large number of tremolite mines
and associated industries have createdwidespread contamination.
Ŷ from the Workers-Community against
Asbestos-Related Industry – an outreach
Closing session platform party
initiative proposed by the Occupational

39

Concluding Thoughts

From the first moments of AAC 2009, the plight of Asia’s
asbestos victims took center stage. Where academic initiatives were discussed, attention focused on how the research
could be of practical assistance to the injured; where asbestos abatement techniques were considered, the focus wason how they could be used to minimize hazardous expos-

A poignant message from Japanese asbestos
victims transmitted during the welcome dinner
set the tone for much of what was to follow.
ures. In the participatory atmosphere created by the conference organizers, experienced Japanese and Korean
researchers interacted with Indonesian colleagues relatively new to the asbestos issue and grass-roots members
from China with no background on asbestos whatsoever.
Everyone had something vital to contribute and all opinions and experiences were given the respect they deserved.
A poignant message from Japanese asbestos victims transmitted during the welcome dinner (April 25) set the tone
for much of what was to follow; expressing sadness at thedamage done, they urged AAC 2009 delegates to work together to end decades of asbestos slaughter. The faces of
those affected in Japan and the faces of those they left behind were a salient reminder of the humanity which underpins everything the ban asbestos campaign stands for.*The presence in Hong Kong of victims’ representatives
from so many countries reminded delegates that while thefaces change, the heartbreak and deprivation caused by asbestos remains the same.
Since the Asian Asbestos Conference 2006 took place in
Bangkok, the regional movement has been reinvigorated
by an influx of members from more countries and sectorsof civil society. The increasing information exchange andcommunication across subject disciplines and national borders has led to more joint initiatives. The energy and new
skills brought to the movement by younger members hascomplimented the experience and knowledge of those notquite so young; working side by side towards common
goals they have made substantial progress in recent years
regarding the banning of asbestos and the empowering of
victims in Asia. Some highlights reported to the conference include:

injuries, environmental pollution and contaminationof consumer products and forced the government toimplement a national ban and take steps to identify
victims;
Ŷ The Philippines: labor federations are progressing a
ban asbestos strategy which relies on political lobbying, building relationships with government agencies
and the use of technology to spread awareness of theasbestos hazard;
Ŷ India: committed doctors, in cooperation with community activists, have embarked on programs toidentify the injured; new outreach programs havebeen launched in mining and industrial areas to raiseasbestos awareness; initial efforts by trade unionists
to organize ship-breaking workers are showing positive results;
Ŷ Indonesia: community activists, in collaboration withJapanese and Korean colleagues, have documented
the transfer of hazardous asbestos technology to Indonesia and are quantifying the asbestos risks to workers and local people in Cibinong;Ŷ Hong Kong: a campaign by asbestos sufferers, family
members and trade unionists resulted in the government adding mesothelioma to a list of compensatedillnesses; projects to assist victims are providing
much needed support; efforts to publicize the potential hazards of asbestos products in Hong Kong public
housing continue;
Ŷ China: research has revealed that people working inor living near chrysotile-using factories on the mainland are at high risk of contracting cancer; positive
results have been reported by a company developing
asbestos-free building materials;
Ŷ Pakistan: At the second meeting of the National Technical Advisory Committee on Chemicals (April,2009), a breakthrough was made with the decision to
include all types of asbestos on a list of hazardous materials;
Ŷ Malaysia: A national trade union center has embarked
upon a program of training, publicity and education toprogress its goal of a comprehensive ban on asbestosuse;Ŷ Sri Lanka: a new law, which will come into force in2009, will list the asbestos industry as “hazardous,”mandate the reporting of asbestos-related illness andintroduce stringent workplace controls in all sectors.

Ŷ Japan: victims continue to keep asbestos high on thenational agenda through sustained political pressure,
medical researchers and trade unionists are working together to delineate a practical approach to assist atrisk groups and new initiatives have been launched tosupport retired workers with asbestos-related diseases;
Ŷ Korea: campaigners have mobilized civil society
around multiple asbestos issues, such as occupational40

The work of AAC 2009 did not end when delegates left
Hong Kong. Only weeks after this major event took place,a story which underlined the ubiquity of the region’s challenges made headline news in South Korea. The article entitled The Deadly Air they Breathed [108] described the*This message can be viewed in a video on the World Asbestos Report
homepage: http://worldasbestosreport.org

after-effects of asbestos mining and processing in
Gwangcheon and Busan. As elsewhere, it is not justformer miners and factory workers who are suffering;people who lived near a train station through which asbestos cargo was transported have also contracted asbestosis.
In Busan alone as many as 440,000 people could be affected by asbestos fallout from manufacturing operations

The globalized asbestos industry, which hasbrought death to diverse populations across Asia,
has benefited from the isolation of dying
individuals and their inability to turn local anger
into action.
which took place within six miles of where they lived. As
local governments and national agencies struggle to cometo terms with the escalating public health disaster, victims
are demanding action. Farmer Jung Ju-yol, a former miner
who is now suffering from an asbestos disease, is also apart-time campaigner who spends his own money to bringvillagers to meetings. “We need to soon stage our own
protest or something… We might even need to get together with the Busan folks at some point,” he told a journalist.

Despite the progress which is being made, Asian asbestos
consumption continues to endanger millions of lives. Numerous conference delegates spoke of low levels of occupational, public and professional asbestos awareness, thedisenfranchisement of asbestos victims, an almost totallack of medical and diagnostic capacity, control of national agendas by industry stakeholders and the prioritizationof economic development over health and safety issues.
As was so clearly illustrated during the asbestos victims’
panel, the mobilization of the injured is key to effectingchange in national asbestos policy. The globalized asbestos industry, which has brought death to diverse populations across Asia, has benefited from the isolation of
dying individuals and their inability to turn local anger into action. The birth of A-BAN means that Asian victims
will no longer be alone; as part of a regional campaigning
network they will have the information and critical mass
to expose the polluters, demand public recognition of theirinjuries and force governments to provide the medicalcare and financial support they need. The formation of ABAN will serve as an enduring legacy of AAC 2009 andwill ensure that the movement to ban asbestos will continue to spread throughout Asia.

41

Postscript

For decades, asbestos stakeholders profited from the global trade in a killer substance; they lied to employees, corrupted civil servants, bribed politicians and perverted thescientific process. When industrialized countries banned asbestos, the hazardous technology was exported to emerging
economies;
twentyyears
after
asbestos
manufacturing was transferred from Japan to Korea, it wassent from Korea to Indonesia; these dangerous processes
are now on their way to mainland China. Left in the wakeof this toxic chain of production were dead and injured
workers, at-risk communities and polluted neighborhoods.
As elsewhere, Asian victims found that when it came tothe crunch, asbestos polluters never paid the price for theirnegligence and greed; the final bill for national consumption was measured in broken families and lives lost, items
which never appeared on corporate balance sheets. The extension of the man-made global asbestos plague to Asia
was initially ignored and then denied by national authorities. When finally forced to engage with this issue, governments demanded the production of national mortality data
to “prove” that asbestos use was hazardous; as if, humanbiology differed in China and France and Thai lungs were
better able to expel asbestos fibers than Australian ones.
Since the AAC 2009, there have been several developments which suggest that the reality of the asbestos challenge faced by Asian populations is becoming ever more
apparent. The asbestos debate, which has spread to new locations, is being impacted by the voice of the victims andcontributions from sectors of civil society new to this issue. In Taipei, the largest city in Taiwan, a meeting took
place in May 2009; following the International Conference on Industrial Risks, Labor and Public Health: An Interdisciplinary Analysis by Social Sciences andEpidemiology, a declaration was issued which called on
countries to “ban the production, manufacture, use andtrade of products containing all types of asbestos, including chrysotile immediately.” Weeks later, researchers from
Korea and Japan returned to Cibinong, Indonesia to undertake additional monitoring – with Indonesian colleagues –of the fallout from asbestos-consuming factories belonging to PT Trigraha and PT Jeil Farjar. While, in the United
Arab Emirates (UAE), an asbestos focus group was convened by a non-profit health and safety organization to produce construction industry guidelines for dealing withasbestos-containing materials. Considering the UAE’s recent building boom and the fact that average annual asbestos consumption between 2005-2007 was 18,673 tons, thisinitiative is certainly much needed [109]. On August 20,
2009, a medical symposium on asbestos took place at the
Shahid Beheshti University of Medical Sciences inTehran; subjects on the agenda included screening for as-

42

bestos-related diseases, radiological and pathological findings for asbestosis and mesothelioma, and treatment
therapies [110]. In India, plans to reopen asbestos mines
in Jaipur attracted criticism from the Mines Labor Protection Campaign, an NGO from Rajasthan, and environmentalists who reiterated the risk of asbestos exposures toworkers in the mines and mills [111]. Whereas, once upona time, trade liberalization of the Indian asbestos industry
might have been implemented without opposition,
nowadays informed citizens are monitoring all attempts toenhance commercial opportunities for this sector.
Municipal, national and judicial bodies in Asia have also
been taking action on the asbestos menace. In the Philippines, a civic resolution ordered that asbestos pollution
caused by the operations of the Lepanto Consolidated
Mining Corporation in the Sitio Sapid region be cleanedup under a controlled toxic waste plan. Lepanto officials
and the company, which was ordered to remove six truckloads of asbestos-contaminated construction debris it had
secretly dumped at Barangay Sapid in 2007, are facing administrative and criminal charges for the improper handling of the toxic waste [112]. At the beginning of July, theBan Asbestos Act of 2009 was tabled by Representative
Raymond C. Mendoza in the Congress of the Philippines.
The bill calls for a ban on the import, manufacture, processing, use and distribution of asbestos as well as othermeasures to safeguard occupational and public health[113]. One month later, the Trade Union Congress of thePhilippines called on the Government to assess the risk
posed by unsafe working practices at the Manila Thermal
Power Plant where hundreds of tons of asbestos-contaminated waste are currently being removed [114]. Korean authorities, who have been under constant pressure after
news of asbestos pollution at industrial sites and in consumer products was released in April 2009, have banned
asbestos from all products for children and products thatcome into contact with the skin. As of September 2009,
manufactured goods must be less than 0.1% asbestos;
manufacturers of paint and wallpaper which use talc will
be compelled to obtain a public certificate proving that thetalc used contains less than 1% asbestos [115]. On July21, at a cabinet meeting in Seoul, legislative revisions toimprove occupational protection from asbestos during construction and demolition work were under consideration[116]. It seems that a colleague from Seoul hit the nail on
the head when he said that anyone who does not know
about asbestos has not been in Korea recently.
Verdicts issued in July 2009 by Japanese courts do notbode well for asbestos defendants. On July 6, Judge
Haruhiko Sakae of the Yokohama District Court orderedthe Government to pay 76.84 million yen (~US$810,000)
for the mesothelioma death at age 51 of Hitoshi Taima, aworker at the U.S. Navy’s Yokosuka base. Taima, who
was employed from 1977 to 1995 by the Japanese Government, was exposed to asbestos whilst working as a mechanic [117]. Two days later, the Chubu Electric Power
Company was ordered to pay 30 million yen (US$317,000) for the mesothelioma death of 67-year-old
Kenji Fujiwara, a former electrician who had worked forthe company from 1958 to 1999. As the ruling highlighted
the defendant’s obligation to protect workers who do notdirectly handle asbestos, it is significant for others withsimilar exposures [118]. These cases not only illustrate thesubstantial level of damages now being awarded for Japanese asbestos deaths but also the potential for increasing thenumber of claimants. It seems that in Japan at least somenegligent corporations are being held to account for thedamage they have done.
While the life and death struggle by civil society to end
the asbestos plague is a priority on every continent it iseven more so in Asia, the region which accounts for the ma-

jority of worldwide consumption. From China’s Sandung
Peninsula to the Cambodian capital, people have the rightto know that their lives are being endangered by avoidable
exposures to asbestos; they have the right to demand that
action is taken to protect themselves and their children.
After years of preliminary work, progress is now being
made; the faces of the victims and their spirit remain the
bedrock of the ban asbestos campaign. The existence ofthe new regional campaigning group A-BAN will serve asa much needed counterweight to industry lobbying; asbestos propaganda will now be challenged at local as well as
national levels. The transfer of hazardous technology willbe tracked and at-risk groups will be told the truth about
the toxic substance poised to invade their communities. In
the months to come, important asbestos meetings will takeplace in Cambodia, India, Japan, the Philippines, Indonesia and Korea. In 2009-2010, new outreach programs andcampaigns will raise awareness, identify victims, lobby
for improved services and press for the introduction of national bans throughout Asia. There is no way to put the asbestos genie back in the bottle. An asbestos-free future ispossible!

43

Appendix A

Hong Kong Declaration towards a Complete Banon all forms of Asbestos
April 27, 2009

The Asian Asbestos Congress 2009 (AAC) was organised jointly by the Asia Monitor Resource Centre (AMRC), International Ban Asbestos Secretariat (IBAS),
Hong Kong Confederation of Trade Unions (HKCTU) and the Association for the
Rights of Industrial Accident Victims (ARIAV) and supported by the Ban Asbestos Network Japan (BANJAN), Ban Asbestos Network Korea (BANKO), Building and Woodworkers International (BWI), International Metalworkers Federation(IMF) and the Asian Network for the Rights of Occupational Accident Victims(ANROAV). Representatives of the International Labour Organization, the World
Health Organization and the International Commission on Occupational Healthtook part in this conference. The conference was attended by more than 200 participants from 24 countries representing the Asia Pacific, Europe, North and SouthAmerica.
Awareness is growing fast throughout Asia of the need to stop the use of all forms
of asbestos and prevent asbestos related diseases. Grassroots action to attain theseaims and achieve fair compensation for victims and their families is spreading. In
recent years, mobilisation by asbestos victims groups has achieved major successes in Japan and Korea, the only two countries in the region which havebanned asbestos. Working with social partners, these groups have highlighted theexistence of national epidemics, raised public awareness of asbestos problems andlobbied governments to address a range of social, political and scientific issues.
Despite this progress, asbestos continues to be used in large quantities in the Asian
region. Aggressive campaigns by vested interests lead by Canada, Russia andBrazil – asbestos producing countries – have increased industry's profits at the expense of hazardous exposures experienced by workers and community members.
Asbestos, the largest contributor to the growing epidemic of occupational cancer,
poses a major threat to public health. The majority of asbestos victims do not receive the medical treatment and compensation to which they should be entitled; indeed it is the victims who pay the price for industry’s profits. The asbestos
industry continues to promote discredited propaganda which alleges that certain
forms of asbestos can be used safely under “controlled conditions.” The only
“safe use of asbestos” is no use. Safer asbestos-free alternatives exist and must be
used.
A concerted effort by asbestos victims groups, trade unions, employers’ organizations, researchers, lawyers, relevant agencies and grassroots groups is needed tostop the use and export of the asbestos hazard to industrially developing countries
from industrialised countries like Japan or Korea where asbestos is banned. It isurgent to disseminate information about the hazards of asbestos to the grassroots,
establish proper diagnostic infrastructure and promote the use of safer alternatives
throughout the region.

44

Recognizing the gravity of the situation and the level of threat posed by the continued use of asbestos in Asia, the participants of the AAC urge governments, theWorld Health Organization, the International Labour Organization, the International Commission on Occupational Health and other international agencies and organizations to:1) Adopt an immediate and complete ban on all forms of asbestos and all processes that involve asbestos including mining, manufacturing or any other activity.
2) Give priority to safer alternatives and implement a logical transition to safer
technologies. Workers and the community should be protected from exposure to
fibres during the transitional period.
3) Ensure that appropriate techniques are used when asbestos removal work is carried out; in the interim, implement a labelling protocol for all asbestos contaminated structures in order to alert workmen and the community of the imminenthazard posed by this contamination.
4) Establish a diagnostic infrastructure so that victims can be correctly diagnosed
and receive timely medical treatment and rehabilitation.
5) Make all efforts to develop a ‘cure’ for asbestos related sicknesses and diseases
including mesothelioma.
6) Make financial restitution to victims of asbestos related illnesses by paying
equitable compensation.
7) Hold companies involved in the transfer of asbestos production to newly industrialising countries criminally liable in the country of origin and country of operation.
8) Ratify the ILO convention 162 and work towards developing National Programmes for Elimination of Asbestos-Related Diseases (NPEAD) in a timely manner.
9) Provide help and support to reinforce the vital work of Asian asbestos victims
groups in order to maximize their efforts to generate awareness about the severityof the asbestos problem.
The AAC delegates are appalled by the unconscionable misconduct of the Canadian government in continuing to fund the discredited Asbestos Institute so that it
can continue its immoral propaganda and promote the export of asbestos disease
to harm people in the developing world.
Recognizing the urgent need for coordinated action in Asia, a new group waslaunched at the conference: the Asian Ban Asbestos Network (A-BAN). The formation of A-BAN is a landmark in the Asian campaign to obtain justice for the asbestos-injured and to implement a regional asbestos ban. The group which
consists mainly of asbestos victims’ organizations, labour unions and environmental justice groups from 16 Asian Pacific countries will work towards strengthening
the grassroots Ban Asbestos movement in Asia.

45

Endnotes and References
1. Zhuoqiong W. Improving Workplace Illness Cure Sought. China Daily– Hong Kong edition. April 25-26, 2009. page 3.
http://www.china.org.cn/government/central_government/200904/25/content_17670255.htm
2. There are, according to this article, 640,000 pneumoconiosis patientsin China with 10,000 new cases reported every year.
3. Summers A.L. Asbestos and the Asbestos Industry. Pitman & Sons,
London. 1919.
4. A total of 400 delegates attended four days of events in Osasco which
included a musical tribute to the victims, plenary sessions, workshops,
round-table discussions, poster presentations, video screenings and aphotographic exhibition.
Kazan-Allen L. Osasco Conference Report. November 10, 2000.
http://ibasecretariat.org/osasco_report.php
5. Kazan-Allen L. Global Asbestos Congress 2004 Report. February 11,2005. http://ibasecretariat.org/lka_gac_2004_online_report.php
6. Kazan-Allen L. Asian Asbestos Conference 2006. July 2006.
http://ibasecretariat.org/lka_asia_asb_conf_aac_2006.php
7. For more information on AAC 2009, see:
http://www.anroav.org/images/dossier_aac_sc_2304.pdf andhttp://www.anroav.org/content/blogsection/9/41/
8. In 1978, Mrs. Tait set up the Society for the Prevention of Asbestosis
and Industrial Diseases, the first asbestos victims’ group in the world;she devoted the next 40 years of her life to obtaining justice for victims.
Her death in February 2009 was a blow to all the members of the global
ban asbestos network.
9. The six countries included those from the Middle East which havebanned asbestos: Kuwait, Oman, Egypt, Saudi Arabia plus Japan and
Korea, the only countries in Asia which have done so.
10. Graphs shown illustrated the correlation between national asbestos
use and mortality incidence, and the dramatic impact national bans haveon overall consumption.
11. Prof. Xiaorong Wang is a researcher in the Department ofCommunity and Family Medicine at the Chinese University of HongKong.
12. In 2000, China mined 300,000+ tons; nowadays, annual production isover 400,000 tons, which makes China the world’s second biggest
asbestos producer. In 2008, China imported 300,000 tons of asbestos,
most of which came from Russia. In China, the majority of asbestos isused for the manufacture of asbestos-cement products; other uses include
friction, sealing and insulation products. Since 2003, the use of all typesof asbestos has been prohibited in the production of friction materials forthe automotive industry.
13. By the end of 2003, a total of 7,907 cases of asbestosis had been
officially registered: “The prevalence of asbestosis reported by different
studies varied widely, ranging from 5 to 40% but over 10% in mostexisting studies. In 1978, the first case of lung cancer with asbestosis wasreported in China.” There are no epidemiological data on the incidence of
mesothelioma or asbestos-related lung cancer in China, although in thequestion and answer session the Professor mentioned that two cases of
pleural mesothelioma had been diagnosed in China.
14. The data source for these figures was given as www.indexmundi.com
The United States Geological Survey estimated China’s asbestos
production in 2005 at 350,000 tons; the figure (from the China Mine
Association) shown by the speaker for the same year was 375,000 tons.
15. T. Kawakami is the Senior Specialist on Occupational Safety and
Health, ILO Subregional office for East Asia, Bangkok.
16. Hisashi Ogawa is from the WHO Regional Office for the Western
Pacific.
17. Emergency Preparedness and Response. Asbestos – hazards and safe
practice for clear-up after tsunami.
http://www.searo.who.int/EN/Section1257/Section2263/Section2310/Sect
ion2320_12504.htm
Information on the WHO asbestos initiative is also available online:
World Health Organization – Elimination of Asbestos-Related Diseases.
http://whqlibdoc.who.int/hq/2006/WHO_SDE_OEH_06.03_eng.pdf
Outline for the Development of National Programmes for Elimination ofAsbestos Related Diseases.
http://whqlibdoc.who.int/hq/2007/WHO_SDE_PHE_07.02_eng.pdf
Cancer Control - Knowledge into Action.
http://whqlibdoc.who.int/hq/2006/WHO_SDE_OEH_06.03_eng.pdf
18. Fiona Murie is the Director of Health and Safety of the Building and46

Wood Workers International. For more on the BWI’s asbestos activities,
see: http://www.bwint.org
19. The resolution stated: “the elimination of the future use of asbestos
and the identification and proper management of asbestos currently inplace are the most effective means to protect workers from asbestos
exposure and to prevent future asbestos-related diseases and deaths…”
20. See: http://www.ncard.org.au/aaarc.html
21. For more details see: http://www.kazanlaw.com/AACWorkshop/
22. These trusts are: ABB Lummus Global Inc, Amatex, AP Green,
Armstrong World Industries, Artra, Babcock & Wilcox, Celotex, CE
Thurston, Combustion Engineering, EJ Bartells, Eagle Picher,Fibreboard, Halliburton, Harbison-Walker, HK Porter, JT Thorpe, Kaiser
Aluminium, Keene, Manville, National Gypsum, Owens Corning,
Plibrico, UNR, United State Gypsum, Western Asbestos.
23. Although the Babcock & Wilcox trust values mesothelioma claims at$90,000, the average payment is $120,000; cases of lung cancer receive
about $35,000-$45,000.
24. Vienna Declaration, February 2008. See:
http://www.bwint.org/pdfs/vienna%20declaration.pdf
25. From the 1950s, Japan imported approximately 10 million tons ofasbestos, of which more than 90% was used for the manufacture ofbuilding materials.
26. During the training, 10-15 workers visited the construction site tocompare actual working conditions with the action checklist. Subsequentdiscussions identified good points, highlighted needed improvements
and made recommendations.
27. In Australia, there are three national codes of practice for the
management of asbestos at workplaces, safe removal of asbestos,analytical asbestos sampling and identification. From 2008, every
building worker is required to undertake eight hours of asbestos training
provided by a registered trainer.
28. The Canadian Autoworkers Union is the largest private sector union
in Canada; its membership has doubled since 1985 and it has 282 local
unions, 1600 bargaining units and 225,000 members. The CAW is in theprocess of merging with other unions to form a broad-based, general
workers' union.
29. According to Professor Inai, since 1948 Japanese victims withoccupational asbestos exposures had been entitled to claim compensationfrom the government compensation scheme for asbestosis, benign
asbestos pleurisy, diffuse pleural thickening, lung cancer andmesothelioma. Victims of non-occupational asbestos exposure who had
contracted either lung cancer or mesothelioma had been able to claim
compensation from a Japanese Relief System since 2006.
30. CT: computerized tomography; MRI: magnetic resonance imaging.
31. At the HCL factory, a range of asbestos products was manufactured
including: clutch plates, brake liners, railway brake blocks, ropes, yarn,
cloth and sheets. Workers, all of whom were ignorant about the asbestos
health hazard, handled the fiber with no regard for the consequences;
they used to play with balls of asbestos. The company management did
not implement control measures to minimize occupational exposures;
mandatory periodic medicals were not carried out.
32. The “healthy worker syndrome” came about because individuals who
were too ill to work either resigned their jobs or died, leaving only thehealthy workers to take part in the research.
33. Under the VRS, companies are able to off-load workers by giving
them a package or incentive to take premature retirement, often using
coercion to force them to accept the conditions on offer.
34. There are numerous talc and asbestos ore deposits in Chungnam. Of
the 30+ asbestos mines in the Province, the Kwangcheon chrysotile
asbestos mine was the biggest in Asia and had 1,000 workers. As aconsequence of asbestos operations and the presence of naturally
occurring asbestos, the levels of neighborhood exposure to serpentine
and amphibole (mainly tremolite) asbestos in this area were elevated.
35. Of the 95 study subjects, nine cases of asbestosis were impossible todiagnose due to the poor quality of the scans.
36. According to a survey conducted in the Mie prefecture, thestandardized proportional mortality ratio for construction workers forstomach cancer is 2.0 and for lung cancer 1.9.
37. Predicted cumulative deaths over the next 40 years are: 72,000 in the
U.S., 250,000 in Europe, 103,000 in Japan and 30,000 in Australia.
38. According to the speaker, serum mesothelin (also known as serummesothelin-related protein or SMRP) is “the most sensitive and specifictest. SMRP is elevated in over half the patients at diagnosis, and inaround 75% of patients at some stage in their illness… elevatedmesothelin/SMRP levels in the pleural fluid are also useful in diagnosis.”
39. See the presentation by Steven Kazan during plenary session 2.
40. All the slides are available online:
http://www.kazanlaw.com/AACWorkshop/
41. Between them, the trusts list 2,980 approved worksites in foreigncountries.
42. http://www.bwasbestostrust.com/
43. In Melaboh (Aceh) one of the closest major towns to the epicenter of
the tsunami, there were 3-4 million cubic meters of rubble whichcontained unknown and unknowable quantities of asbestos. This waste
was bulldozed and then trucked by government paid contractors to theedge of town and buried. After the Yogyakarta earthquake, there were 10
million cubic meters of rubble which was dealt with by a system called“Gotong Royong'” in which local communities did most of theimmediate clean-up with little assistance from the aid community.
44. In Aceh an estimated 600,000 survivors were left homeless requiring
approximately 130,000 emergency/temporary and then permanent
homes. During the Yogyakarta earthquake, approximately 300,000
houses were completely destroyed and another 300,000 very badly
damaged. In both cases, asbestos retailers quickly capitalized on the postdisaster demand for new building materials.
45. http://www.astm.org
46. E2394, which was intended for use by supervisors, managers,
government agencies and NGOs, was applicable to conditions indeveloping and developed countries; the need for worker training andhands-on experience with asbestos products was indicated as was thehazard of using power tools. The emphasis of the standard was on theprotection of those workers most at-risk of exposure to airborne asbestos.
No asbestos regulations were cited in the protocol which could therefore
be used as a guideline for national asbestos control regulations where
needed.
47. The ESB is a government-owned utility which generates, transmits
and supplies electricity using fossil fuel, hydro and wind-power.
48. The first Irish legislation pertaining to the environmental asbestos
hazard related to the disposal of toxic and dangerous waste and came into
force in 1983.
49. ESB personnel estimated that the 198 tons of asbestos-contaminatedinfill used, necessitated the removal of 3,500+ tons of waste during theclean-up operations.
50. The techniques adopted by the ESM were derived from Irish and EU
legislation and best international practices.
51. Vincent Brennan is from the Physical Plant Department, Training &Compliance Office of the University of Vermont, U.S.
52. Mr. Kropiunik is from aetas Ziviltechniker GmbH, Vienna, Austria:
http://www.aetas.at
53. The scaffolding had to be constructed to allow trains to pass and toleave sufficient space for workers. This was a difficult construction
especially given the air dynamics posed by the arrival of trains. The
scaffolding was 180 meters long and required emergency exits for theoperatives.
54. Mr. Zhen is from Elkem Materials, Beijing, China.
55. Data on the incidence of asbestos-related disease in China is
deficient; however, some figures were sourced from the website of China
safety zone (http://www.aqtd.cn/zyjkaq/html/25779.html) which showedthat there were 7,907 cases of asbestos-related disease and 923 deaths in
China in 2003 as compared to 4,289 cases of disease and 622 deaths in
1986.
56. Mr. Kien is from the Institute of Mechanics, Vietnamese Academy of
Science and Technology, Vietnam.
57. Ms. Dutta is from Corporate Accountability – The Other Media, India.
58. Previously, Canada was the largest supplier of asbestos to India, now
it is Russia. Annual import levels are rising. In 2006, India imported
306,000 tons: 152,820 tons from Russia and 63,980 tons from Canada.
Ninety per cent of the imported asbestos is used in the manufacture ofasbestos-cement building products. There are 17 major asbestos-cementcompanies operating from 61 production sites. Sales of asbestos-cement
products increased in 2007-2008 by 16.5%. The annual turnover of the
Indian asbestos-cement industry is Rs 3000 crores [A crore is a unit in
the Indian numbering system equal to ten million]; most of the
production is for building and roofing materials which are used in

housing, schools, railways. Brake linings and textiles are also
manufactured.
59. Tremolite mining is banned in India but the mines still operate.
60. The ALU is affiliated with the Building and Woodworkers
International (BWI).
61. Substantial amounts are imported each year for use in asbestoscement products for the building sector. In the last 50 years, the import
and consumption of asbestos had been increasing.
62. A third bill to ban asbestos (HB No. 5931) is circulating; this billprovides for a comprehensive ban within two years of enactment andstipulates fines or prison time as punishments for the illegal use ofasbestos.
63. Nearly 30% of all hospitals are furnished with asbestos-containing
furniture; almost 3,000 tables containing asbestos were distributed tohigh schools.
64. From 1992-2000, the speaker had identified 1,500 cases ofmesothelioma; by 2007, that figure had risen to 6,000.
65. Chrysotile and tremolite fibers have been found during autopsies.
66. Pakistan signed the Rotterdam Convention in 1999 but only ratified
it in 2005. http://www.pic.int/home.php?type=t&id=63&sid=17
67. PIC: Prior Informed Consent Procedure of the Rotterdam Convention.
68. Minutes of Second Meeting of National Technical Advisory
Committee on Chemicals (NTACC), April 21, 2009.
69. Asbestos has been used in Indonesia since 1959; almost 90% ofasbestos processed nowadays is for asbestos-cement roofing products.
70. Established in 1984, the HKWHC is a non-profitmaking organization
formed by a group of medical doctors, OHS professionals, rehabilitation
therapists and social workers that aims to raise standards of occupationalsafety and health.
71. It is interesting to note that in the years mentioned (2003, 2004 and2007), 111 tons, 59 tons and 8 tons of the imports were exported which
equates to: 92%, 55% and 17%. Deducting exports from imports meansthat asbestos consumption for those years was 10 tons, 48 tons and 39
tons respectively.
72. The peak years for asbestos consumption in Hong Kong were 19601963, when average annual use was around 10 kilograms per capita.
73. Mr. Bin Mohammad is from the Malaysian Trades Union Congress.
74. Although asbestos was never mined in Malaysia, since the 1950s theasbestos sector has been producing roofing, flat sheets, pipes, friction
pads and gaskets. In addition to the 2,000 workers receiving direct
exposures to asbestos, thousands more are at risk from exposures inshipyards, at construction sites and in the motor vehicle industry.
75. These include the: Factories & Machinery (Asbestos Process)Regulation (1986), Occupational Safety and Health Act (1994),
Classification, Packaging & Labeling of Hazardous Chemicals
Regulation (1997), Use & Standards of Exposure to Chemicals
Hazardous to Health Regulation (2000), Guidelines for the Control ofChemicals Hazardous to Health (2001), Guidelines on Medical
Surveillance (2001), Notification of Accident, Dangerous Occurrence,
Occupational Poisoning and Occupational Disease Regulations (2004),
Environmental Quality (Scheduled Waste Regulations 1989).
76. When the largest asbestos factory in Malaysia ceased operations,former employees who had contracted cancer were left high and dry.
77. Ms. Yoshizaki is a member of the Japan Association of
Mesothelioma and Asbestos-Related Disease Victims and Their Families.
78. As of January 1, 2009, the import, sale and use of asbestos products
in Korea were banned.
79. The contamination of talc by asbestos has been known for decades
and many countries in Western Europe and the U.S. have restricted theuse of talc for babies. Talc has other uses including those in thepharmaceutical, cosmetic, paper manufacture and ceramic industries.
80. The number of banned drugs was reduced from 1,122 to 1,080 on
April 10, 2009; on April 17, KFDA decreased the number of banned
drugs to 215.
81. The victims who spoke were: Mr. Tang Chun Shing – shipyard
repairer (aged 86), Mr. Chan Tong – shipyard worker (aged 81) andasbestos grille wall removers Mr. Leung Kam On (62) and Mr. Lai
Cheong Fook (67).
82. ARIAV provides regular home visits and facilitates the setting up of
local self-help networks and groups. Coping strategies, rehabilitation
exercises and counseling services are offered which recognize thepsychological and physical needs of victims.

47

Endnotes and References
83. A chronology of Japanese trade with western countries shown by the
speaker highlighted contact with U.S. companies, Johns Manville andU.S. Gypsum, and UK companies: Turner & Newall, Cape and Sprayed
Insulation.
84. Professor Muryama is from Waseda University, Japan.
85. Throughout the twentieth century, Japanese companies werecommercially active in Asia with ventures in Korea, Taiwan and China
owned by Asano Slate, 20 plants in China, Korea, Taiwan, Singapore,
Malaysia, Thailand, the Philippines, Vietnam and Indonesia owned by
Nichias and factories in Malaysia run by Nozawa Asbestos. Nowadays,
Japanese companies have investments in asbestos businesses inIndonesia, Malaysia, Thailand, Singapore, Taiwan, China, India and thePhilippines.
86. In 1970, the Japanese company Nichias Asbestos relocated its
asbestos operations from the Tatsuta Nichias plant in Nara, Japan to JeilAsbestos in Busan, Korea; from 1990 onwards, these operations were
exported from Korea to PT Jeil Fajar and PT Trigraha in Indonesia; it
has been reported that these manufacturing operations are now being
relocated from Indonesia to Sandung Jibo, China.
87. The 2008 exposure levels of Indonesian workers were higher orsimilar to those which had been found in Korea and Japan.
88. Airborne asbestos concentrations decreased with distance from thefactory.
89. There are no data on the incidence of asbestos-related disease or
claims made for these diseases in Indonesia.
90. Other research conducted as part of this project established thatmaterial produced at this factory contained a high concentration ofchrysotile asbestos.
91. Pictures shown of fiber-blocked ventilation outlets and the presenceof deteriorating asbestos-cement roofing sheets at the factory were
evidence of the pollution.
92. Ms. Giannasi is the Coordinator of the Virtual-Citizens’ Network for
the Ban of Asbestos in Latin America and a founding member of
ABREA, the Brazilian Association of the Asbestos-Exposed.
93. A copy of a bill of lading for an asbestos shipment obtained by the
speaker indicated that chrysotile asbestos, from the SAMA mine in
Minaçu, was being shipped on February 13, 2009 to BRI Ramco Lanka
Limited in Makandura Industrial Park, Makandura, Sri Lanka.
94. From 1888 to the 1960s, James Hardie built up its Australianasbestos-cement operations; during the 1970s, the company expanded its
interests and began asbestos operations in Malaysia, Indonesia and otherdeveloping countries.
95. Puttick v Tenon Limited (formerly called Fletcher Challenge Forests
Limited) [2008] HCA 54 (12 November 2008).
96. Status of Shipbreaking Workers in India – A Survey. International
Metalworkers Federation. 2006.
http://www.imfmetal.org/files/06042810465779/Shipbreaking_survey.pdf
97. Membership at the Mumbai and Alang ship-breaking yards is now
1,205 and 4,500 respectively.
98. Prominent asbestos victims’ groups include: Associação Brasileirados Expostos ao Amianto (ABREA), Brazil, Asociación Frente al
Asbesto (AFA), Peru, Associação de Vítimas do Amianto de Maipúin,
Chile and Asociación Argentina de Expuestos al Amianto (ASAREA),
Argentina.
99. Research has established that there is a high incidence of asbestosis
amongst workers and residents from five asbestos mining villages.
100. Victims from Busan have been at the forefront of the BANKO
movement; they established Korea’s first asbestos victims’ support groupon December 28, 2007; the first court ruling to award compensation formesothelioma was handed down in December 2007 to the husband of anasbestos victim from Busan.
101. A survey of 100 school buildings undertaken in December 2007 by
the Ministry of Education showed that 90% of elementary schools and
94% of high schools contained asbestos materials.
102. See: http:// www.adao.us
103. Other new media platforms the speaker mentioned were: blogs,

message boards, petitions, newsletters, eZines, podcasts, webcasts andteleseminars/webinair.
104. The sixth Annual Asbestos Awareness Day Conference will be on
April 9-11, 2010 in Chicago.
105. At the most recent Rotterdam Convention meeting (October 2008),
of 126 signatory countries industry bullies from Canada and Russia only
managed to get a handful of countries to object to the listing ofchrysotile; they were: Kazakhstan, India, Pakistan, Mexico, thePhilippines, Vietnam, Kyrgyzstan and Ukraine.
106. This document appeared on the World Bank website in May 2009, amonth after the Hong Kong conference. See:
http://siteresources.worldbank.org/EXTPOPS/Resources/AsbestosGuidan
ceNoteFinal.pdf
107. Elizabeth Tang is from the Hong Kong Confederation of Trade
Unions.
108. Lee J. The Deadly Air They Breathed. July 24, 2009. Global Post.
http://www.globalpost.com/dispatch/south-korea/090608/asbestos-minesrespiratory-diseases
109. The use of asbestos-containing products is legal in the UAE forwater supply and sewage. In 2007, 17,000+ tons of asbestos wasimported by the UAE. See: Faulkner C. Asbestos Management in the
UAE. July 26, 2009. http://www.constructionweekonline.com/article5932-asbestos_management_in_the_uae/110. Notice of this event was received by email on August 27, 2009.
According to data from the United States Geological Services, annual
asbestos consumption in Iran from 2005 to 2007 was 34,655 tons.
111. Dey A. Activists Oppose Government Move on Asbestos. August 4,
2009.
http://www1.timesofindia.indiatimes.com/articleshow/4854157.cms
112. Tests of this material showed it contained 10% amosite asbestos.
Cleanup of Philippines Asbestos Dump Ordered. June 2, 2009.
http://www.asbestos.net/news/cleanup-of-philippines-asbestos-dumpordered.html
According to Alderman Richard Kilaan, charges will be brought against
the chief executive officer, the mining firm’s board of directors,
administrative officials and the resident manager.
Trade Union Congress of the Philippines. Town Readies Criminal Casevs Lepanto Execs. August 5, 2009.
http://www.tucp.org.ph/news/index.php/2009/08/town-readies-criminalcase-vs-lepanto-execs/
113. Trade Union Congress of the Philippines. TUCP Party List
representative files bill in Congress banning asbestos. July 16, 2009.
http://www.tucp.org.ph/news/index.php/2009/07/tucp-party-listrepresentative-files-bill-in-congress-banning-asbestos/114. TUCP Concerned that Asbestos Puts Workers at risk at Manila
Thermal Power Plant. August 4, 2009.
http://www.tucp.org.ph/news/index.php/2009/08/tucp-concerned-thatasbestos-puts-workers-at-risk-at-manila-thermal-power-plant-calls-ongovernment-to-verify-reports/
115. Asbestos Banned in All Manufactured Products. June 30, 2009.
http://english.chosun.com/site/data/html_dir/2009/06/30/2009063000502.
html
Ho-jeong L. Asbestos Found in 17 products in 6 categories. JoongAng
Daily. July 23, 2009.
http://joongangdaily.joins.com/article/view.asp?aid=2907785
116. Han J. Regulations on Asbestos Will Be Tightened. July 21, 2009.
http://www.koreatimes.co.kr/www/news/nation/2009/07/113_48849.html
117. Between 1999 and 2003, forty claimants who contracted asbestosrelated diseases through occupational exposures at the base received
compensation as a result of judicial rulings and negotiated settlements.
Gov't ordered to pay 76.84 million over U.S. base worker's asbestosrelated death. The Mainichi Daily News. July 6, 2009.
http://mdn.mainichi.jp/mdnnews/national/archive/news/2009/07/06/2009
0706p2a00m0na017000c.html
118. Chubu Electric Power ordered to compensate family over worker's
asbestos-related death. Mainichi Daily News. July 8,

Conference delegates participate in protests and tributes on International
Workers' Memorial Day in central Hong Kong, April 28, 200948

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