LONDON (AP) — Victims of Brazil’s worst environmental catastrophe had been taking their case for compensation to a UK court docket on Monday, nearly 9 years after tons of poisonous mining waste poured into a significant waterway, killing 19 folks and devastating native communities.
The category motion lawsuit on the Excessive Courtroom in London seeks an estimated 36 billion kilos ($47 billion) in damages from the worldwide mining large BHP. That may make it the most important environmental payout ever, in keeping with Pogust Goodhead, the legislation agency representing the plaintiffs.
BHP owns 50% of Samarco, the Brazilian firm that operates the iron ore mine the place a tailings dam ruptured on Nov. 5, 2015, releasing sufficient mine waste to fill 13,000 Olympic-size swimming swimming pools into the Doce River in southeastern Brazil. The case was filed in Britain as a result of one in every of BHP’s two fundamental authorized entities was based mostly in London on the time.
The trial comes days after BHP introduced that the corporate and its associate in Samarco, Vale SA, had been negotiating a settlement with public authorities in Brazil that would present $31.7 billion for folks, communities and the surroundings broken.
The potential settlement received’t have any affect on the London case, Pogust Goodhead mentioned in a press release.
“Such timing solely proves that the businesses accountable for Brazil’s largest environmental catastrophe are decided to do every little thing they’ll to forestall the victims from in search of justice, and are keen to perpetuate the shameful conduct they’ve demonstrated during the last 9 years,” the agency mentioned.
Melbourne, Australia-based BHP mentioned the doable settlement would resolve a declare filed by Brazil’s Federal Public Prosecution Workplace and different claims by Brazilian public authorities.
“BHP will proceed to defend the (UK) motion, which it believes is pointless as a result of it duplicates issues already coated by the continued reparation work and authorized proceedings in Brazil,” BHP mentioned Saturday.
The catastrophe destroyed two villages, killed 14 tons of freshwater fish and broken 660 kilometers (410 miles) of the Doce River, in keeping with a research by the College of Ulster.
The river, which the Krenak Indigenous folks revere as a deity, was polluted so badly that it has but to get better.
