Tag Archives: environmental crime

Rich Environmental Criminals

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“The brutality and profit margins in the area of environmental crime are almost unimaginable. Cartels have taken over entire sectors of illegal mining, the timber trade and waste disposal,” according to Sasa Braun, intelligence officer with Interpol’s environmental security program  Braun listed examples. Villages in Peru that had resisted deforestation efforts had been razed to the ground by criminal gangs in retribution, he said, while illegal fishing fleets had thrown crew overboard to avoid having to pay them.

Environmental crime has many faces and includes the illegal wildlife trade, illegal logging, illegal waste disposal and the illegal discharge of pollutants into the atmosphere, water or soil. It is a lucrative business for transnational crime networks. Illegal waste trafficking, for example, accounts for $10 to 12 billion (€10.28 to 12.34 billion) annually, according to 2016 figures from the United Nations Environment Program. Criminal networks save on the costs of proper disposal and obtaining permits. For some crime networks, the profits from waste management are so huge that it has become more interesting than drug trafficking…The profits from illegal logging have also grown…

According to the European Union Agency for Law Enforcement Cooperation (Europol), environmental crime — the third most lucrative area of crime worldwide after drug trafficking and counterfeit goods — generates profits of between $110 billion and $280 billion each year.

Excerpts from Environmental crime: Profit can be higher than drug trade, DW, Oct. 16, 2022

Tricks of Illegal Waste Dumping

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The US Navy has launched its own investigation into allegations that its contractor has been dumping on Subic Bay hazardous wastes which it siphons from US Navy ships docked here.  In an e-mailed statement on Saturday, Cynthia Cook, deputy press attache of the US Embassy in Manila, said the US Navy had “initiated its own inquiry into allegations of hazardous waste dumping by Glenn Defense Marine Philippines, a contractor for the US Navy in the Philippines.”  Cook said the embassy was aware of the investigation being conducted by the Subic Bay Metropolitan Authority (SBMA), and that it would “take appropriate action depending on the outcome of those processes.”

The SBMA board of directors is meeting on Monday to discuss the results of the initial investigation into the reported dumping by Glenn Defense Marine Philippines, the local operator of the Malaysian-owned Glenn Defense Marine Asia, said SBMA Chair Roberto Garcia.  In a letter to the SBMA earlier, the lawyers of Glenn Defense claimed that the Presidential Commission on the Visiting Forces Agreement (VFACOM) was the only agency authorized to address complaints about toxic dumping at Subic Bay.  Also on Saturday, the Subic Bay Freeport Chamber of Commerce announced it had suspended the membership of Glenn Defense, a registered locator of the Subic Bay Freeport.

Danny Piano, SBFCC president, said the group was aware of the alleged dumping in Subic waters since October. He said the chamber’s environmental committee has been on the lookout for potential environmental problems around the freeport.  Piano recounted: “At around 8 a.m. on Oct. 15, members of the committee spotted a marine [vessel] collecting liquid waste from a US Navy ship at Alava Pier. They became curious [as to] why a [ship], and not a [sewage] truck, would be performing waste collection [for] a naval ship already berthed at a pier…  “Sensing potential hazard, the members reported the situation to the SBMA ecology department for a spot check and to make sure that proper procedures were followed in dumping the waste.”

The vessel, MT Glenn Guardian, had been carrying around 50,000 gallons of domestic waste and around 200 gallons of bilge water (or a combination of water, oil, and grease), which were untreated according to laboratory tests, Piano said.

By Robert Gonzaga, US Navy begins inquiry into toxic waste dumping, Inquirer Central Luzon, Nov. 10, 210