Extradite Anderson, Bhopal gas victims urge Obama
By IANSMonday, June 14, 2010
BHOPAL - Survivors of the 1984 Bhopal gas tragedy, the world’s worst industrial disaster, and human rights activists Monday appealed to US President Barack Obama to initiate moves to extradite former Union Carbide Corp CEO Warren Anderson to India to stand trial.
The Bhopal Gas Peedit Mahila Udyog Sanghatan said Obama’s reported statement describing the Bhopal gas tragedy as being India’s “internal matter” was wrong.
“We demand the US President Barack Obama should initiate moves to extradite former Union Carbide Corp CEO Warren Anderson to India to face legal action,” the NGO’s convener Abdul Jabbar said.
In a signed letter to the US president, the survivors and activists urged Obama to help them get “real justice” in the disaster that struck the Madhya Pradesh capital December 2-3, 1984, killing and maiming thousands when lethal methyl isocyanate (MIC) gas leaked from a pesticide plant of Union Carbide India Limited (UCIL).
The letter heaped praise on Obama for his tough stand against BP over the Gulf of Mexico oil spill. They said: “Your (Obama) tough stand on the issue particularly about corporate accountability is worthy of emulation around the world.”
“We draw your attention to the bigger disaster that struck the city of Bhopal in India in December 1984 which killed over 15,000 people (official records) and about 25,000 (unofficial records) while seriously injuring nearly half-a-million people,” said the letter sent by Abdul Jabbar and others.
The survivors sought that Obama should allow judicial processes to fix “responsibility of the corporations and individuals of the US responsible for the Bhopal tragedy” and work with the “same sense of collaboration with the Indian government on this issue (Bhopal) that you proclaim you have achieved with the Indian government on the issue of global terrorism among other things”.
