3019/2022/WEB 'Shipbreaking II'

Wednesday 13 July at 10:00 CEST

OBJECTIVES

End of life ships that are not planned to be used anymore must be dismantled properly, following the strict waste management and recycling rules set by the Basel and Hong Kong Conventions. However the clean and safe disposal of ships is an expensive process. According to international and national legislations the ship owners must exercise due diligence and must avoid to do business with unscrupulous scrap dealers. However due to profit reasons in practice old vessels are often sold by owners to scrap dealer criminals in order to get rid of the `problem` of old vessels. These corrupt cash buyers bring the ships to India, Bangladesh, Pakistan or other developing countries with weaker environmental enforcement capacity where the vessels are sold to and demolished by the local shipbreaking industry without any care. During the illegal breaking of ships, toxic substances are dumped into the environment polluting the seashores and the oceans. Moreover these sites are featured by unsafe and unhealthy conditions, child labour and chronic exploitation of workers.

The basic features of this criminal phenomenon had been discussed in the CEPOL webinar “Shipbreaking” organised in 2021 (The recorded version is available at the CEPOL electronic platform `LEEd` under section “recorded webinars”/2021). That training event raised awareness on the characteristics of the crime and described the principles of waste management rules in view of Basel Convention and Hong Kong Convention.

This second webinar is the follow-up of the first one discussing recent developments and case examples from the perspective of German and Dutch enforcement authorities. Additionally the NGO Shipbreaking Platform a pioneering civilian initiative on the topic will also share their views of the current situation.

TARGET GROUP

Law enforcement officers specialised on environmental crime or economic crime. Officials working for environmental inspectorates, port authorities and similar key regulatory bodies are also welcome.