BANI demands asbestos free schools and public buildings like Calcutta High Court and Indian Railways

Responding to an order dated November 26, 2024 by National Green Tribunal (NGT) 's principal bench comprising of judicial member Justice Sudhir Agarwal and expert member Dr. Afroz Ahmad, Ban Asbestos Network of India (BANI) has pointed out that in its submission before the NGT, India's Asbestos Fiber Cement Product Manufacturers Association refers to judgement of 1995 by the Supreme Court in Consumer Education Resource Centre v. Union of India but omits significant part of the directions with regard to ILO resolution concerning Asbestos and the compensation to the certified victims in order to mislead the NGT. The next date of hearing is on December 17, 2024. The case was registered on April 17, 2023. So far 11 orders have been passed in the case.

Press Trust of India, The Tribune, Business Standard, The Print, Udayvani, Deccan Herald, The Hill Times, The Telegraph, Amar Ujala, Outlook Business have reported that NGT has said that Environment Ministry causing 'serious obstruction' in functioning. The Sunday Standard has reported that NGT has slammed MoEF for ‘stalling action’ over asbestos sheets in educational institutions. It has been reported that Tribunal Faces Roadblock: MoEFCC’s Silence on Asbestos Hazards in Schools

NGT's order reads: "Issue of non-occupational health hazards likely to be caused by use of Asbestos sheets in educational institutional to students has been raised in this application. Vide order dated 18.07.2024, we required Ministry of Environment, Forest and Climate Change (hereinafter referred to as ‘MoEF&CC’) to find out whether in respect of use of asbestos sheets in Educational Institutions, there are some different kinds of health hazards to students i.e. non-occupational health hazards, comparing to health hazards applicable to workers in Industrial Sector, and if there is a distinction, let the matter be given a scientific study and report of such scientific study be submitted along with reply. Tribunal considered the matter on 25.09.2024 and found that though an affidavit dated 24.09.2024 has been filed by MoEF&CC but no specific reply has been given in respect of scientific study on the question posed by Tribunal in para 6 of order dated 18.07.2024. Tribunal by order dated 25.09.2024 again directed Ministry to get study conducted by constituting an expert Committee comprising of specialist of multi-discipline and submit report within two months. Shri Narender Pal Singh, Advocate present on behalf of MoEF&CC has stated that a Committee has been constituted comprising of 12 persons but could not give any reply, whether any study has been conducted and report has been submitted or not. No official from MoEF&CC is present to apprise Tribunal about compliance of Tribunal’s order dated 25.09.2024 and no report has been placed on record. In these facts and circumstances, Tribunal, due to lack of appropriate response on the part of MoEF&CC is not in a position to proceed further in the matter and this a serious obstruction caused in functioning of Tribunal by Environmental Ministry itself. In these facts and circumstances, having no option, we are constrained to direct an officer of MoEF&CC to remain present personally before Tribunal, not below the rank of Joint Secretary, who is well conversant with the subject in issue, on the next date, and to explain as to why order dated 25.09.2024 has not been complied with by it though non-compliance of Tribunal’s order constitute an offence under Section 26 of National Green Tribunal Act, 2010."

Dr. Raja Singh, the applicant who has filed the application before the NGT is a visiting faculty in the Department of Architecture, School of Planning and Architecture, New Delhi for issuance of directions for stopping the use of Asbestos roof sheets for schools as a measure of public health and safety and environmental health under the Environment Protection Act 1981 and Air (Prevention and Control) of Pollution Act 1986 at the pan-India level. The applicant has submitted that asbestos roofing is composed of a mixture of asbestos fibers and cement. Many times, schools buildings use these asbestos sheets, especially in the rural areas. Over time, the asbestos sheets become friable or crumble and asbestos fibers are released from these sheets which can become airborne in the indoor air of the school and be inhaled by the occupants of the school who may be small school going children. These buildings also have higher dust pollution. The inhalation of the asbestos fibers causes lung diseases which may turn fatal. The peculiar character of diseases related to asbestos fiber inhalation is their high latency period and any student who is exposed at a young age will only get the manifestations of the diseases after decades during his/her bread winning or family raising period. Asbestos being a non-biodegradable material is a health hazard to school children. The applicant has referred to research titled ‘The natural reduction of threat in selected systems of old buildings containing asbestos’ published in Nature Scientific Reports. 

This study underlines that "The health aspect of asbestos works must be taken into account relative to contemporary tendencies leaning towards absolute asbestos removal. Pleural mesothelioma cancer is characterized by a 40-year latency period. Therefore, results of exposure from 1990 to 2019 will result in diseases arising in 2030–2059. This applies in particular to the higher asbestos exposures arising during the asbestos removal programs. Accelerated and imprecise disassembly, may result in increasing mesothelioma in future decades. Research on the increase in mortality in the USA in the 1980s caused by asbestos removal confirmed this problem." 

 

The conclusion of the study is as under: "1. The concentration of asbestos fibers in indoor air of “rigid-constructions” is most often small, ~ 0–300 f/m3; “non-rigid construction” is often higher.
    2. In a such buildings after many years of operation the air quality getting better over time.
    3. Active behavior in buildings with asbestos is a cause of above-normal dust pollution. For this reason, children and young people should not use buildings with asbestos, regardless of their physical condition.
    4. In a normally used building containing ACM, ventilation and air exchange are important factors in reducing the concentration of asbestos dust over time.
    5. If there is no evidence of an increase in the concentration of asbestos in the air, the removal of ACM from such facilities should be postponed until the building is no longer used.
    6. Repeated confirmation of low concentrations and/or confirmed concentration decreases in the building allows an extension of safe facility operation.
    7. The reduction of asbestos dust in buildings can be a normal and natural process after proper and long service life (if the operation is not accompanied by the destruction of asbestos). Such conditions are met by many buildings with non-friable ACM, in which asbestos is insulated from the internal air. An example of this construction is BISTYP." BISTYP seems to refer to a Polish design of industrial building of rigid structure. 
 

BANI has also pointed out that the Asbestos Fiber Cement Product Manufacturers Association, a cartel of asbestos based companies which has referred to a “National Study on Occupational Safety, Health and Working Environment in Asbestos Cement Product Industries” covering 50 functional asbestos cement product industries of the country carried out by the Directorate General Factory Advice Service and Labour Institutes (DGFASLI) under the Ministry of Labour and Employment. This study found that out of 2603 workers, 10 cases were suspected cases of asbestos related disorders. This study came under scrutiny of a paper entitled “Analysis of the Indian Government’s position on the use of asbestos and its health effects” published in Public Health Action (June 21, 2023) by Dr. R. Singh and Prof. A. L. Frank. The paper concludes that the DGFASLI “study has some potential limitations, including the possibility that disease latency could be a factor, as the presence of disease may only be revealed decades after exposure. Furthermore, there appears to be no record of external peer review by an organisation outside the one conducting the study.”

This dishonest and insincere approach of the asbestos companies and DGFASLI demonstrates "their pre-existing ideological commitment to support corporate interests over worker or community interests."  The Supreme Court in Writ Petition (Civil) No.206 of 1986 had given the following directions on January 27, 1995. It reads: “All the industries are directed

(1) To maintain and keep maintaining the health record of every worker up to a minimum period of 40 years from the beginning of the employment or 15 years after retirement or cessation of the employment whichever is later;

(2) The Membrane Filter test, to detect asbestos fibre should be adopted by all the factories or establishments at par with the Metalliferrous Mines Regulations, 1961; and Vienna Convention and Rules issued thereunder;

(3)  All the factories whether covered by the Employees State Insurance Act or Workmen's Compensation Act or otherwise are directed to compulsorily insure health coverage to every worker;

(4) The Union and the State Governments are directed to review the standards of permissible exposure limit value of fibre/cc in tune with the international standards reducing the permissible content as prayed in the writ petition referred to at the beginning. The review shall be continued after every 10 yews and also as an when the I.L.O. gives directions in this behalf consistent with its recommendations or any Conventions;

(5) The Union and all the State Governments are directed to consider inclusion of such of those small scale factory or factories or industries to protect health hazards of the worker engaged in the manufacture of asbestos or its ancillary produce;

(6) The appropriate Inspector of Factories in particular of the State of Gujarat, is directed to send all the workers, examined by the concerned ESI hospital, for re-examination by the National Institute of Occupational Health to detect whether all or any of them are suffering from asbestosis. In case of the positive Ending that all or any of them ant suffering from the occupational health hazards, each such worker shall be entitled to compensation in a sum of rupees one lakh payable by the concerned factory or industry or establishment within a period of three months from the date of certification by the National Institute of Occupational Health."  

The members of the India's Asbestos Fiber Cement Product Manufacturers Association have not been complying with these directions of the Supreme Court. They are trying to mislead the Tribunal by withholding the full text of the landmark judgement of the Supreme Court which has recognised right to health as part of fundamental right to health.

The word "Asbestos" has become so notorious that Asbestos Cement Products Manufacturers Association has changed its name to hide the word "Asbestos". Now it calls itself "Fiber Cement Product Manufacturers Association"! But in their naked lust for profit they will have present and future generations of Indians and residents in India including the foreign embassies and foreign visitors whose countries have banned all kinds of asbestos, that foreign asbestos is “safe”. 

Significantly, in Writ Petition (Civil). No. 14729 (W) of 2016, the Division Bench of Acting Chief Justice Nishita Mhatre and Justice Tapabrata Chakraborty has passed the verdict observing, “The High Court main building is undergoing repairs with the assistance of the Public Works Department (PWD) of the Government of West Bengal and other Authorities. When the entire renovation is undertaken, it is expected that the High Court and the PWD or, any other body entrusted with the renovation will ensure that the asbestos-sheets, which have been used for roofing, would be replaced by any other materials which are non-carcinogenic.”

Calcutta High Court has recorded that “there is sufficient study material indicating that asbestos sheets used for roofing could cause cancer” and “various documents, issued by the World Health Organization (WHO), and other materials obtained from the Internet, that the exposure to asbestos including chrysotile causes lung cancer, mesothelioma and asbestosis.” It was contended by the petitioner that “the High Court should not continue to use these materials for roofing, especially after legislation in different parts of the world has been enacted on recognizing the potential health risk of asbestos to the citizens at large. Even in India several Acts recognized the fact that asbestos is a health-hazard.

 

In a related development, Indian Railways is removing asbestos roofs from 7,364 railway stations all over India. But instead of learning from this positive step, Stores/North Eastern Railway, Gorakhpur has invited tenders (Tender Reference Number: 28240783) for the supply of Compressed Asbestos Fiber Jointing Sheet (3.2 mm thick, conforming to IS:2712/1998 GR 0.1, oil-resistant, 1500-1800 mm long). North Eastern Railway, Gorakhpur should learn from Railways Ministry;s Research Designs & Standards Organisation (RDSO), the research and development and railway technical specification development organisation which functions as a technical adviser and consultant to the Railway Board, the Zonal Railways, the Railway Production Units, RITES, RailTel and Ircon International in respect of design and standardization of railway equipment and problems related to railway construction, operations and maintenance. In April 2001, RDSO developed new kinds of asbestos-free composite materials for use in brake blocks. These are known as the 'L' type brake blocks and after being introduced for BG, were introduced on MG in 2005.

 

Notably, the government of India has banned mining of all kinds of asbestos due to its harmful effect on human health. 

The Asbestos Fiber Cement Product Manufacturers Association will have media, legislatures and courts and residents of India believe that Indian asbestos is unsafe, hazardous, poisonous and harmful but asbestos from Russia, Brazil, Kazakhstan and China is safe, non-hazardous, non-poisonous and harm free.

India is the world’s largest asbestos importer and consumer. As per United States Geological Survey, India used 408,000t in 2021 and 424,000t in 2022. As per Government of India, India imported 436,119t in 2021  and 403,292t in 2022. Indian Minerals Year Book reveals that although India banned mining of all kinds of asbestos including chrysotile asbestos due to its harmful health effect but it continues to import it from China besides Russia, Kazakhstan and Brazil unmindful of the fact that Brazilian court has banned its use in Brazil.

It has been estimated that one person dies from mesothelioma for every 170 tons of asbestos consumed. WHO estimates we have107,000 deaths worldwide per year from occupational exposure to asbestos.If non occupational exposure is added it reaches a figure of about 120,000deaths. Average world consumption/year 30-60 years ago was -- looks like 3/2 of what it is now (2 million metric tons/year). Give India its share of that based on its share of global consumption. At 300,000 tons in 2013, that's about 18,000 deaths (15% of 120,000).  Asbestos diseases have a very long incubation period. So if you are exposed today to an asbestos fibre, you are likely to get the disease in next 10-35 years.

It as been estimated by a Canadian jurist that approximately 50, 000 people die every year due to asbestos related cancer. But so far Government of India and state governments has failed to take a pro-people’s health position and a scientific stand on the import of chrysotile asbestos whose mining is technically banned in India. It is a matter of fact that health is a state subject.

Asbestos is like a time bomb to the lungs and Indians will suffer the most. If it is banned today that does not mean people will not suffer. Because of past usage people will continue to suffer from these diseases.

The Asbestos Fiber Cement Product Manufacturers Association will have all Indians believe that the governmental patronage they are enjoying is not linked to their donations to ruling parties under Section 182 of the Companies Act, 2013.

Since 2002 BANI’s work is dedicated to the implementation of the Court’s directions and the recommendations of ILO and WHO to prevent preventable diseases and preventable deaths by prevention of asbestos trade, manufacture and use. It demands revision of the provisions of the Factories Act, 1948 which declare manufacture, handling and processing of Asbestos and its products as Hazardous Process but do not impose ban on manufacture, handling and processing of asbestos and asbestos based products. It seeks amendment in the Schedule XIV, Section 87 of the Factories Act which deals Dangerous Operation of “Handling and Processing of Asbestos, Manufacture of any Article or Substance of Asbestos and any other Process of Manufacture or otherwise in which Asbestos is used in any Form’ to ensure that India supports listing of chrysotile asbestos under list of hazardous substances as per UN’s Rotterdam Convention. 

BANI demands cancellation of all the environmental clearances and No Objection Certificates given to asbestos based factories and ban on all asbestos based products. It seeks legal and medical relief for the victims of incurable asbestos related diseases caused by primary and secondary exposure. It wants asbestos free schools and hospitals, asbestos free powder, asbestos free water supply pipes and asbestos free vehicles. It demands decontamination of all the public and private buildings including foreign embassies which are ridden with asbestos fibers. The decision making with regard to asbestos must be shifted from the commerce ministry, a promoter of trade in asbestos, to the health ministry, a regulator of health hazards. The latter must be empowered to ensure that it gives precedence to public health.      

In such a context, there is an urgent to take note of:

-Calcutta High Court’s verdict drawing  on Supreme Court's verdict of 1995 by the bench of Justice K. Ramaswamy, Chief Justice A. M. Ahmadi and Justice M.M. Punchhi; 

-WHO's publication dated September 27, 2024 refers to the World Health Assembly Resolution 58.22 on cancer prevention urges Member States to pay special attention to cancers for which avoidable exposure is a factor, including exposure to chemicals at the workplace and in the environment. Eliminating asbestos-related diseases is particularly targeted at countries still using chrysotile asbestos, in addition to assistance in relation to exposures arising from historical use of all forms of asbestos. WHO, in collaboration with the International Labour Organization and other intergovernmental organizations and civil society, works with countries towards elimination of asbestos-related diseases by: recognizing that the most efficient way to eliminate asbestos-related diseases is to stop the use of all types of asbestos; providing information about solutions for replacing asbestos with safer substitutes and developing economic and technological mechanisms to stimulate its replacement;taking measures to prevent exposure to asbestos in place and during asbestos removal (abatement);improving early diagnosis, treatment, and rehabilitation services for asbestos-related diseases; establishing registries of people with past and/or current exposures to asbestos and organizing medical surveillance of exposed workers; and providing information on the hazards associated with asbestos-containing materials and products, and by raising awareness that waste containing asbestos should be treated as hazardous waste;

-Need to announce the compensation package for present and future victims of asbestos diseases as it has done in the case of Silicosis and make the asbestos companies criminally liable for knowingly exposing citizens and consumers of asbestos products;

-The fact that every international health agency of repute including the World Health Organization, the International Labor Organization, International Agency for Research on Cancer, Occupational Safety and Health Administration, National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health, and the American Cancer Society agree there is no safe level of asbestos exposure. Most recently, the International Agency for Research on Cancer (IARC) reconfirmed that all commercial asbestos fibers - including chrysotile, the most commercially used form of asbestos - cause lung cancer and mesothelioma. In addition, IARC newly confirmed that there is sufficient evidence that asbestos causes ovarian cancer and reconfirmed asbestos causes laryngeal cancer;

-The World Health Organisation estimates that asbestos already claims 107,000 lives a year. Even that conservative estimate means every five minutes around the clock a person dies of asbestos related disease. The ongoing use of the asbestos fibre kills at least 300 people every day;

-World Bank's Asbestos Good Practice Guidelines-These Guidelines, as well as its earlier Environmental, Health & Safety General Guidelines, require that the use of asbestos must be avoided in new construction in projects funded by the World Bank around the world. The Guidelines also provide information on available safer alternatives to asbestos;

 

-Asian Development Bank (ADB)'s Good Practice Guidance for the Management and Control of Asbestos: Protecting Workplaces and Communities from Asbestos Exposure Risks, March 2022

-Human biology is same everywhere if the asbestos is deemed hazardous in the developed countries; it must be deemed so in West Bengal too.

There is abundance of incontrovertible adverse health effects asbestos based plants and products which create a compelling logic for the phase out of all kinds of asbestos including white chrysotile to protect the lives of present and future generations.

Stephan Schmidheiny, Yale awarded asbestos billionaire called to answer, for the asbestos-related deaths of 392 people

 

REPORT of the Eternit  HEARING 13.11.2024

Eternit Bis trial. Turin, maxi-court room ‘Giuseppe Casalbore’, November the 13^th, 2024, 9 a.m.: the Assizes appeal trial begins against the Swiss entrepreneur Stephan Schmidheiny, called to answer, for the asbestos-related deaths of 392 people from Casale Monferrato. He is defended by lawyers Astolfo Di Amato and Guido Carlo Alleva.

An ‘endless story’, according to many.

A story of 'an extraordinary drama’, says PP Dr Sara Panelli, with her colleagues Drs Gianfranco Colace and Mariagiovanna Compare.

The Court is chaired by Dr Cristina Domaneschi, assisted by Dr Elisabetta Gallino and the six popular judges [citizens aged 30 to 65 on the electoral registry randomly selected from a list they have to apply for in their Municipality of residence- hereafter Jury Members] plus six alternate jurors.

SUMMARY

1 - Report of the President of the Court of Appeal: how the Court of Assizes motivated the sentence.

2 - Schmidheiny was aware of the serious risks of asbestos: the strategy of deception. The Neuss conference. Auls 76, the Disinformation Handbook.

3 - The diagnosis: immunohistochemistry, but not only.

4 - Five points which make it an extraordinary case: the number of people killed; Schmidheiny in the world elite of asbestos; the choice not to speak of the dangers of asbestos; the dignity of the victims; restorative justice.

5 - Restorative justice: what the defence says

6 - Next hearing.

1 - REPORT OF THE PRESIDENT OF THE ASSIZE COURT

Court Pr4esident Domaneschi, called all the parties and having seen that the defendant was absent, summarised the case, focusing on the central features of the Assizes Court verdict issued in June 2023 by the Novara Court of Assizes.

The court considered Schmidheiny's position as the effective head of Eternit: although he had no formal position in the company, several witnesses including by people with top positions in the company identified him as the person who made strategic choices and made decisions. He was the recognised head of [Italian] Eternit. That Court also deemed that, in spite of some remedial measures in the factory such as changing the manufacturing cycle from dry to wet, and the installation of dust capturing devices on certain machinery, the defendant did not adequately reduce exposure to dust, both inside and outside the work place.

With regard to the defendant's knowledge, the Novara judges, while affirming that Schmidheiny was definitely in possession of specific and in-depth scientific knowledge about the link between asbestos and mesothelioma, considered it reasonable that the defendant be convinced of the controlled use of asbestos, without stopping production; in other words, according to the Novara Court, Schmidheiny did not act with malice (wilfulness), but was guilty, due to negligence, imprudence, and inexperience considering the rules and regulations of the time.

The sentence was appealed by both the prosecution and the defence: the former alleging wilful misconduct, the latter insisting on acquittal.

At the end of the report, the speeches of the three prosecutors began: Dr Panelli and Dr Colace of the Turin Public Prosecution and Dr Mariagiovanna Compare of the Vercelli Public Prosecution (the latter seconded for this case).

2 - SCHMIDHEINY AWARE OF THE SERIOUS RISKS OF ASBESTOS

‘Read what the Neuss Conference was all about’. PP Dr Gianfranco Colace addressed the Court and Jury urging them to carefully read the proceedings of that event that he sees as key to the trial to understand how much, how and since when the defendant had been aware of the serious risks of asbestos.

Neuss (German municipality in the northern Rhineland where Dr Robock, a scientist working for Schmidheiny, had a scientific laboratory. The Neuss document illustrates the core of the defendant’s strategy of deception against the workers and the community. Indeed, during the  Neuss Meeting, Schmidheiny ‘made a true confession’, said PP Dr Colace: in three days, between 28^th  and 30^th  June 1976, the entrepreneur explained what asbestos caused to the 35 top managers of the Eternit group, whom he had summoned. ‘A true confession,’ the prosecutor insisted.  Schmidheiny said to his closest collaborators: ‘I know. I know everything’. What did he know? Colace claims that the defendant was well aware of the results of scientific and epidemiological studies that had proved the deadly danger of asbestos. He was well aware of this, according to the reconstruction set out by both PPs Dr Colace and Dr Panelli, also because the Schmidheiny family was part of the worldwide ‘cartel’ of asbestos producers.

After the first conference in Neuss, a second meeting followed in December, when ‘Auls 76’, the first handbook on how to react and what to say to journalists and others) containing ‘the Eternit group's policy and strategy to conceal the danger of asbestos’ was launched. In fact, ‘the 35 managers were “shocked” (verbatim term from the minutes of the conference) and Schmidheiny told them that the workers should not be informed lest they too be shocked. Auls, Colace insisted, dictated the behaviour and responses that must be given so that ‘the existence of our industry is not jeopardised. We must react decisively and fight with all our means'. To those who ask about the risks of asbestos, reassuring explanations must be given: ‘Asbestos as such is not dangerous. There is no danger to (workers') families as long as there is no test to show it. The existence of danger for those living near the plant can be absolutely excluded'. These phrases are contained in Auls76, which Colace calls a ‘manual of disinformation’.

So, according to the prosecutor, ‘we cannot treat Schmidheiny as a normal employer whom we reproach for being negligent! He had more knowledge than anyone. He knew'.

3 - THE CERTAINTY OF DIAGNOSIS

Is the diagnosis of mesothelioma only certain if supported by the most up-to-date markers of immunohistochemistry? So argues the defence.

The public prosecutor's office rejected this approach, with the support, stresses Public Prosecutor Dr Mariagiovanna Compare, ‘of our consultants whose high level of authority is established and widely recognised’. As she had already done in the Court of Assizes, the public prosecutor reiterates it now in the appeal: there is no doubt that immunohistochemistry is essential to ascertain mesothelioma, and there is no doubt about the validity of the current markers, but, diagnosis is made taking into account other types of tests and investigations, and above all the overall assessment of the clinical picture.

The prosecutor stated that the defence's objections should thus be rejected and reiterated the validity of all 392 diagnoses. Not only that; Dr Compare emphasised that even the less current diagnoses were carried out as scrupulously as possible by the doctors who treated the patients because the overriding interest of every diagnosis is precisely to identify the definite cause of the illness and to apply the most suitable therapies; it would be truly strange if the diagnosis held to be true and certain to treat patients were not considered correct in court.

4 - FIVE POINTS OF EXTRAORDINARINESS

A story of ‘an extraordinary drama’, as Dr Sara Panelli called it, is by definition ‘extraordinary’.

She summarised five points which made it stand out.

The number of deaths. 'There are staggering numbers in this trial: 392 deaths bearing the signature of asbestos! These people developed a malignant cancer called mesothelioma. ‘It is a very rare tumour; according to numerous epidemiological studies,’ Panelli explained, ‘the number of new cases per year, nationally, should be 60; in reality, the National Mesothelioma Registry reports 1600’. But it is Casale, with a population below 40,000, that is frightening: ‘According to estimates, we should expect 1 new case per year; therefore, in the 30 years between 1990 and 2019, 60 new cases should have been recorded. But instead? It was 661 [and over 3-fold in the district], and that is only taking certain diagnoses into account'. This means that ‘we have over 600 cases that should not have occurred’. Dr Panelli stops to catch her breath and adds with a sigh: ‘But they are dead, eh! They are people,' he punctuates, ’who should not have died! If there had not been asbestos pollution inside the factory and in the surrounding environment, those people would not have died!'

The exceptional the business position. ‘The Schmidheiny family,’ said the prosecutor, showing explanatory slides, ‘was in the elite of the “asbestos kings”. There was Johns-Manville in the United States, Turner-Newall in Great Britain (the ‘Ferodo’ brand of car brakes is one of theirs) and, in continental Europe, the Emsens and Schmidheiny families dominated. ‘The industrialists of the asbestos elite met, decided prices, policies, international strategies to manage and control the world market. They were fully informed about the outcomes of scientific studies'.

An example: Pathologist Dr Chris Wagner, from Johannesburg, had detected 33 cases of mesothelioma, both among workers in an asbestos mine in South Africa and among those living in nearby houses. Double exposure: occupational and environmental. Did the Schmidheinys know this? Why, they had bought the mines in South Africa from the British. And when was Wagner's study released? Presented in 1959 in Johannesburg and published in 1961. What was the conclusion of that study? ‘Wagner,’ Panelli explained, ‘said that there was no safe way to extract asbestos and process it. There isn't. And the asbestos kings know this, they have the first-hand scientific information!'.

Silence on the danger of asbestos. Faced with the known and proven danger (in addition to Wagner's study, Panelli cites others: Doll's, whom Turner & Newall failed to silence, and the arguments of the scientist Dr Selikoff at the famous 1964 New York Conference), ‘they chose to remain silent: neither the workers nor the people living around the plant were informed’. Obviously, if it had been known that people were dying of asbestos – dy-ing - the company would have closed down. ‘If I had known that people were dying of asbestos, like hell I would have continued working there!' a former worker testified at the first large trial.

So what? There is silence, because ‘knowledge would have brought the asbestos market to a halt’. Something, however, leaks out, articles, conferences. So what? The message is passed on that asbestos can be used safely. ‘The work carried out in the factory plants’ said Panelli, ‘are what the internal documents defined as ‘small improvements’, that is, ‘some concessions to the unions’ to ‘not wake the sleeping dogs’, which, however,' says Panelli, “have no effectiveness, and the disproportionate number of deaths at Casale proves it”.

Extraordinary dignity of the Casale victims. There is an unexpected attendance, in the court room. It is 11.35 a.m. and Dr Panelli falls silent, looks up and, in a way, gives the floor to the witness: On the screens, placed in three locations, Romana Blasotti Pavesi, the historical president of Afeva (Association of families and victims of asbestos in Casale) looms. She died last September; she was 95 years old on March the 13^th 2024. Yet there she is, very much present, her wrinkles deep, her booming voice, her words inflexible in a recording that belies nothing: ‘It is right to work, it is important and necessary, but you cannot die for work’. In the video she shakes her head and her blue eyes are sad: ‘You cannot die from work,’ she repeats. Her voice continues to shake, her face, clear and firm, does not let go.

 ‘All the witnesses,’ the prosecutor recalls, ‘were limpid, punctual, composed, imbued with sadness and suffering’ [Romana lost many members of her family]. The defence argues, in its grounds for appeal (as it had also stressed in its arguments), that those testimonies are not entirely reliable because memory at a distance of time does not preserve intact images. ‘That is not true,’ Panelli replies, ‘the loss of a loved one makes the memory everlasting’.

Finally: ‘Restorative justice’. That is: ‘An extraordinary opportunity for Schmidheiny as a man, the philanthropist he wants to be’.

It is the first time, in the long, detailed endless history of the Eternit trials, that ‘restorative justice’ enters the courtroom.

The suggestion comes from Prosecutor Dr Sara Panelli, the magistrate who, with her colleagues Gianfranco Colace and, at the time, PP Dr Raffaele Guariniello, conducted the monumental 2005 investigations for the first Eternit trial for wilful disaster.

Sara Panelli is now the prosecutor supporting the prosecution in the Eternit Bis appeal trial at the Court of Assizes, and, at her side, she has her colleague, Dr Gianfranco Colace (and, in addition, today, Dr Mariagiovanna Compare).

They know all the ins and outs of this judicial story, they have read, studied and written thousands of pages, they have consulted first-rate expert witnesses to have complex scientific studies explained to them, they have listened to hundreds of witnesses - the families of the victims and the patients themselves - and they have met the anguished eyes behind those voices. They believe there is an extensive evidentiary record ('More than incomplete material! In this trial, there is far too much material') to support the accusation against the defendant. Dr Panelli introduces a new theme, restorative justice, which, she emphasises several times as it has no bearing on the criminal sphere. It is a thing in itself. It is a choice that speaks to public spirit, a choice of maturity, a quest for reconciliation with a wounded community.

For a few minutes, the Court, maxi-Courtroom 1, suspends its role and echoes this proposal: a new way to resolve a conflict, to re-establish a human relationship with the victims and the community which has long been broken. ‘It is an additional path to the one we exercise in this trial, ‘she explains’ and it does not require any admission of responsibility. What happens is in the hands of the parties who identify an impartial mediator and agree on the time, place and manner of action'. ‘It is not up to us,’ she concludes, ‘to establish how and when to evaluate this possibility, no, but it is up to us to propose it. It is an extraordinary opportunity to follow a additional [supplementary, complementary] path'.

5 - RESTORATIVE JUSTICE: WHAT THE DEFENCE THINK ABOUT IT

The defence lawyers, asked after the hearing on Wednesday 13 November, agreed to give their opinion on ‘restorative justice’.

Lawyer Alleva. ‘With respect to this trial, I am unable to give a specific answer and I cannot/will not do so precisely out of respect for the proceedings themselves. From a general point of view, however, I have always been a great supporter of ‘restorative justice’; in terms of legal approach and from a cultural, intellectual point of view, I think it is a very important path that I hope will be used by our society, by our legal system and become part of our way of conceiving justice. The subject has now come up in this trial, I hope it can be food for thought.

Lawyer Di Amato: ‘Restorative justice has great potential, the implementation of which depends on the quality of the people called upon to administer it. Mediators in particular should have a psychological ability to get in touch with the parties, which would require appropriate training courses of which currently lack.

6 - NEXT HEARINGS

The Eternit Bis appeal trial in the Court of Appeal of Assizes resumes in Turin, in Courtroom Giuseppe Casalbore, at 10 a.m. on Wednesday November the 20^th 2024. The second hearing is expected to continue until 4.30 p.m. or a little later. The Prosecution will conclude will be completed and some of the plaintiff's lawyers may commence.

Following hearings: November 27^th ; December 4^th, 11^th and 18^th , 2024. 

https://www.silmos.it/eternit-bis-storia-umana-di-una-drammaticita-fuori-dal

lordinario-la-romana-torna-in-aula/

 

Legal remedy for migrant workers and their families in the asbestos industry and construction industry

Working and living environment of the labour in the hazardous industry: Legal remedy for migrant workers and their families in the asbestos industry and construction industry

Abstract: Almost all the hazardous industries employ migrant workers as contract and causal workers. They face hazards on a permanent basis but their job is of temporary nature in legal sense, which implies that they do not have the cover of social security. A significant number of them are undocumented workers. These workers and their families constitute a community which are perennially exposed to environmental and occupational exposures. Studies have inferred that lack of documentation and data is limiting any action to measure and address these exposure risks. The living and working conditions of migrant and non-migrant workers and their families make them vulnerable to exposures from hazardous asbestos industry and asbestos handling construction industry. In general, these workers do not have adequate legal, social and occupational protection. Their condition remains invisible to the law makers, law enforcers, planners, policy makers and public institutions concerned with public health despite the fact that WHO and ILO have recommended elimination of all kinds of asbestos, and some 70 countries have banned it.   

The need for tracking diseases and deaths resulting from particular conditions known to be caused almost exclusively by environmental and occupational exposure, has been ignored for long. It has been estimated that enviro-occupational diseases kill six times more workers (migrants and  non-migrants) than accidents. The data for migrants is yet to be disaggregated. The externalization of environmental and occupational health cost of these migrant workers makes hazardous industries like asbestos industry and construction industry, which are  poorly regulated, quite profitable. Most of the fatal environmental and occupational diseases in these industries go unreported. This holds true for the asbestos industry and construction industry. Besides the asbestos based factories, the sites of construction industry contain asbestos in many building materials. Studies have pointed out that men and women who work in the hazardous industry have higher rates of environmental and occupational diseases than the general population.

It is essential for effective preventive policy interventions to provide social security to workers, and their families who too get exposed to carcinogenic mineral fibers of asbestos.These workers end up exposing their family members when they carry the toxic fibers of asbestos on their bodies and clothes to their houses and habitations. This constitutes secondary exposure. The families of the migrant and non-migrant workers face constant risk of asbestos related diseases due to secondary exposure. Studies have shown that besides workers and consumers, wives, children, and other relatives of workers who handle asbestos or who encounter asbestos in their working environment, have higher rates of asbestos related diseases. These workers and their families are subject to poor and hazardous living and working conditions.  

This policy brief makes a case for improved data on the incidence, causes and circumstances of the diseases and deaths of migrant workers and their families in the asbestos industry. In the 29th year of Supreme Court’s landmark judgement on right health in a asbestos case, the policy brief makes a compelling case for creating a database that covers all the diseases in India which contains data on fatal diseases, disaggregated by cause of death, age and sex, work-related diseases and diseases of migrant and non-migrant workers and their families using “attributable fractions” to quantify the link between diseases like asbestosis, ovarian cancer, lung cancer mesothelioma and enviro-occupational exposure. This is required to ensure just compensation to the victims as well.

The policy brief provides an outline of the sites of exposure, modes of exposure, asbestos related diseases, environmentally unsound living conditions, preventive measures and legal remedies with specific Reference to asbestos industry and asbestos handling construction industry.

Dr. Gopal Krishna

The policy brief was presented at the Annual Research and Orientation Workshop in Kolkata. The presenter cited Al Jazeera documentary- Asbestos: The toxic mineral endangering millions in India

 

Romana Blasotti Pavesi, leader of Eternit asbestos victims wished to look into the eyes of Stephan Schmidheiny, Yale awarded asbestos billionaire

Romana Blasotti Pavesi passed away on Wednesday, September the 11th,  in the early hours of the afternoon. She was 95 years old, her last birthday had been on the 3rd of March 2024. In 1988 she was appointed president of Afled (Association of Families of Deceased Eternit Workers) which, changed its name to Afeva (Association of Families and Victims of Asbestos) in 1998. She remained president until 2015, then was made honorary president. 

She was succeeded by Beppe Manfredi (who died of mesothelioma the following year), with Giovanni Cappa as vice-president. He too suffered from the same disease, and died in 2020. Since 2016, Giuliana Busto, sister of Piercarlo Busto, aka il Pica, a well-known Casale athlete who was struck down by the same disease at the age of 33, has been president of Afeva. Romana Blasotti Pavesi was made of Commendatore della Repubblica (Order to the Merit of the Republic) for her great commitment in seeking justice and truth as president of the Associazione di familiari e vittime amianto (Afeva - Association of asbestos relatives and victims). The rosary will be this evening, Thursday 12 September, at 7pm, in Casale Monferrato, in the Parish of the Immaculate Heart of Mary. In the same church, the funeral will take place tomorrow, Friday 13 September, at 2.45pm. The councillors of the ‘Casale davvero’  coalition have petitioned the mayor Emanuele Capra to proclaim a day of city mourning on the occasion of the funeral: ‘We are talking about - they write in the request, also subscribed by the city's PD (Democratic Party) - a person who was a symbol, in Italy and around the world, of the struggle against asbestos and who was able to communicate to the younger generations his intimate suffering with a spirit of resilience and a very strong charge of positivity inspired by a sublime humanity’. Mayor Capra and City Council President Giovanni Battista Filiberti welcomed the proposal: ‘A dutiful initiative that unites all political forces, associations and city associations’. Tomorrow, a minute's silence will be observed at the inauguration of the Wine Festival.

'Shame on you! We are more than you are!’ She shouted this to the whole of Italy, in those difficult and painful days when the people of Casale were faced with a terrible choice, which, at the time, I called ‘the devil's offer’ in ‘La Stampa’ . Reminiscent of childhood catechism: ‘The devil,’ the parish priest had warned us, ‘presents himself in disguise, he attracts you by showing only the beautiful and shiny side, but, beware, he will deceive you’. That offer of money, made by the main defendant in the Eternit maxi-trial to silence the voice of the municipality of Casale Monferrato, would have meant abandoning any civil action in exchange that is, forcing Municipality would no longer, or ever again, represent the community tormented by asbestos: that is why I called it the devil’s offer.  Many people were upset, Romana was upset. She was not at peace. In fact, she was very angry. ‘The Swiss, as he was known,  did a shameful thing: he behaved in the same devious way just like asbestos did killing people, by killing at random,’ she had told ‘La Stampa’ on the eve of the verdict of the court of first instance.

In the meantime, the municipality had re-evaluated the initial temptations and rejected the offer. ‘I thank Health Minister Balduzzi and that large part of the city that showed a deep civic sense,’ Romana Blasotti Pavesi said. ‘Had it been accepted, I would have personally felt ashamed to present myself to the magistrates who have worked so many years to reach this moment. Today, instead, I feel proud.

The national media, newspapers and TV stations were interested in the case. It was the late autumn of 2011. On December the 20th, journalist and anchorman Gad Lerner, had dedicated an episode to the storm unleashed by the ‘devil's offer’, with studio guests and an external link to a large group of people of Casale. Romana was in the front row. They put a microphone in front of her. Her voice thundered: ‘Shame on you!’, an attack against those who were against accepting the ‘offer/pact’. She shouted for everyone: for those who had died and for those who, while still alive, mourned their dead, and for those who, while still alive, were already suffering from mesothelioma. ‘there are more of us than of you,’ she shouted to make the air vibrate!’

Dr Daniela Degiovanni, who had shared decades of life, struggle and confidences with Romana, squeezed her arm. She confided later: ‘I was afraid she was going to have a heart attack’.

Romana’s powerful voice was one of her distinguishing features, along with her sky blue eyes, which could be as bright as aquamarine or as icy as a glacier, set in a face that all that  of suffering had turned into carved stone.

Her heart  was made of a special material, I cannot say how, nor why but it could not otherwise have withstood the blows fiercely inflicted by fate. One day she said: ‘I had even thought that my family had fallen the victim of an evil spell’. Romana buried her husband Mario, a former Eternit worker, in 1983, her sister Libera, in 1989, her nephew Enrico Malavasi (50, Libera's son), in 2003, her cousin Anna, and her daughter Maria Rosa, in 2004. For all of them, only one culprit: mesothelioma caused by asbestos. At the beginning of this year, yet another loss when her son Ottavio also predeceased her.

She had become president of Afeva, the Casale association of the families and victims of asbestos, in 1988. Mario had died and she couldn't come to terms with it: not with the mourning, a burden she carried intimately without exposing it out of modesty and reserve; what she couldn't come to terms with was that people died because of their work. Like Mario, other husbands, and wives, and children, and siblings. An unbearable injustice. They offered her the role to represent them. She thought about it for a moment, then said: ‘I don't know if I am able, but if you help me, I am ready to fight’. She did so, and remained the president for almost thirty years, with integrity and without relenting, flanked and supported by what she called her guardian angels: Bruno Pesce and Nicola Pondrano. She listened, she documented, she read a lot, she asked to know what was happening. She went where needed: to speak, to testify, to spur people on. She was especially keen to speak to youngsters: ‘We,’ he would say, ‘have come this far, and, mind you, we have done a lot. But it's not over. Now it is your turn to continue. She gave a stern warning: ‘You must fight, until we have justice!’ 

She wore the slogan ‘Eternit Justice’ proudly: printed on the three coloured (Italian) flag that flew on her terrace, in via Cavalcavia, and on the yellow badge pinned to her shirt.

The night before the hearing in which the court presided over by Giuseppe Casalbore would read the first-degree verdict of the Eternit maxi-trial, in Turin, Romana was restless. ‘I'm an optimist, but I can’t hide my level of anxiety,’ she confided, ‘I've taken a few drops of sleeping pill’. But she reacted: ‘I don't want to let fear get the better of me, I want to think that our wait for justice will be rewarded. Who knows, maybe I will finally be able to cry again'. 

She had stopped crying long before the trial, because she said her supply of tears had been completely exhausted when her daughter Maria Rosa had told her mother that she too was ‘sick like dad’. Mesothelioma. That ‘she was so beautiful Maria Rosa, and had beautiful hair. And she was so young'. When she died, she was 50 years old. Maria Rosa left behind a son Michele, who in turn had a daughter, Francesca, now 12 years old: she adored her great grandmother Romana who looked after her when she was a little child.

At the trial, Romana Blasotti Pavesi told her story which travelled the world: all over Europe, in Brazil, in the United States, in Canada, in Japan and even in the villages of the Amazon: ‘Romana you are great, Romana you are strong’ they wrote there. The world knew that emblematic story that was a copy of the pain of hundreds, thousands of other lives similarly killed by the dust, pouvri as it was known in the local dialect. The days before speaking as a witness, she could not enter the courtroom, as is the rule. So she was forced to wait outside, she could only know what was going on inside through the stories of others. A soul in pain, pacing up and down the corridors, at times sitting on the benches to give her aching legs a rest.

Then, on the day of that first verdict, 13 February 2012, she stood up and held Degio’s hand as the oncologist Daniela Degiovanni who has ‘seen’ and treated so many patients was known locally. She closed his eyes, perhaps wondering if all that could be done had been done, or perhaps recalling all the names and faces she had promised she would fight for justice.

In the years that followed there was an Appeal Trial and then the Court of Cassation in Rome. That morning she was more than anxious: Romana was restless. In the afternoon, when all that had to be said had been said, she fell silent in the long wait.

We were sitting on an uncomfortable bench, a little out of the way, side by side, in semi-darkness, speechless, our eyes pointed at the floor, stubbornly not letting ourselves be carried away by any temptation to make predictions. At a certain point of the evening, the signal came: we were called into the large and sumptuous courtroom and the Court of Cassation ruled on the statute of limitations. Everything was quashed, cancelled. An uproar followed, indignant voices. I looked for her in the confusion and found her, standing in that hidden corner we had occupied while waiting. Her gaze was bewildered and dry. ‘We fought so hard to get to this result?’ she whispered. Her son Octavius dragged her away because she was too tired. The next day, with lucidity she commented: ‘The Cassation decided this way because they don't know the history of Casale’. She meant that those judges, so far from here, do not know the constant fear of falling ill, the anguish of those who fall ill, the suffering of those who remain. And yet, she did not feel defeated: ‘We’, she said resolutely, ‘we have convinced the world that we are right’. Bruised, but not bent. One day she said to Mayor Titti Palazzetti: ‘When are we going to inaugurate the park where the factory once stood? It took so long to reclaim it, decontaminate and tear it down, now it's time to transform it'. We had been there, together, visiting the abandoned plant still standing, many years before, in an autumn dusk that made the place look even more gloomy. There was a small group of us trade unionists, former workers and family members of workers, together with Dr Luigi Mara who had asked and obtained permission to make an inspection. We wore masks and puffy white overalls; we looked like ghosts immersed in a greenish semi-darkness. Someone had a torch and shone it on the walls or against broken glass. Romana wanted to know where Mario had worked, ‘this was his shopfloor ‘explained one. She insisted on seeing the ‘Kremlin’, a bad place in the basement, where the dust felt like you were eating it, not just breathing it. ‘That's where it was,‘ said those who had worked there, “they used to send those who were considered the ”hotheads’ who had perhaps complained about the working conditions.’ And Romana looked out at a gaping hole in the floor that was lost in a black, bleak, breathless background. 

Mayor Palazzetti had promised Romana that the Eternot Park would be finished. And so it was, in September 2016, in the presence and with the blessing of the President of the Republic Sergio Mattarella. The park has an athletics track, lawns and plants, benches and games for children. There is also a living monument, created by the artist Gea Casolaro, the Davidia involucrata nursery: the so-called ‘handkerchief plants’, constantly cared for by a group of volunteers, the prize called the Eternot Nursery Prize awarded every year. 

Another monument, by artist Italietta Carbone, was also inaugurated: it depicts a little girl running while flying a kite, the symbol of a free soul. Everyone calls it ‘Romana's kite’: Romana, the girl from Slovenia who arrived in Casale at the age of seventeen and who, maintaining her free and indomitable spirit, shaped so much of this town’s history.

Respectful and polite at all times (she greeted and shook hands with the defenders of the Swiss defendant with sincere politeness, because ‘we are adversaries, not enemies’), she never lowered her gaze, convinced and proud of advancing a just cause. She would have liked to come face to face with the Swiss entrepreneur. ‘I would like to look him in the eye and ask him why...’. but Stephan Schmidheiny (in picture), the Yale University awarded asbestos billionaire  decided not to ever come forward. If he had done so, if he had found the courage to peer into Romana's sky blue eyes, he would have understood what his only path to salvation was and is: financing a treatment, the  cure. He could still do it, somewhere Romana would hear about it and she could finally weep with relief, freely.

by Silvana MOSSANO

Translation by Vicky Franzinetti

Also read:The asbestos victims of Eternit – in pictures

 Alumni ask Yale to revoke honorary degree 

 Lessons for India from Swiss asbestos tycoon found guilty for causing death of 392 people