Maidan

Ukrainian authorities, human rights, and environment protection in the light of "phosphorus" accident

“MAIDAN ALLIANCE”. KYIV. UKRAINE. JULY 30, 2007

The train crash near Ukrainian city Lviv that resulted in a spill of poisonous matter technically labeled “yellow phosphorus”, fire and negative ecological consequences, has been topping the Ukrainian news for three weeks. Like 21 year ago, after the Chornobyl catastrophe, the courageous actions of the clean-up squad prevented dangerous consequences of the accident for a lot of people. However it is vital to examine the accident from the point of view of the human rights and the standards of good governance.

The most disturbing is the absence of immediate, full and adequate information about the accident that was finally noticed even by the President and the Prime Minister of Ukraine. The first days after the accident revealed that protection of citizens is not a priority of government policy. The conspicuously low educational level of the officials involved and their unwillingness to engage experts into localization and liquidation of the accident had put citizens' lives in danger. An analysis of public documents on official websites of various government bodies shows that the lessons of Chornobyl about the vital necessity of competent public communication between the government bodies and the society have not been learned properly by the Ukrainian authorities. Ukraine has no system to provide urgent and detailed public information in cases of technogenic catastrophes and natural disasters. The absence of such a system leads to conflicting statements in the media, dangerous prognoses and the spread of panic. This unfortunate situation is caused by the fact that the Ukrainian legislation does not fully protect the citizens’ right to information and does not provide for prosecution of government officials for not providing the information.

We come to a well-grounded conclusion that the government authorities, particularly the Ministry for Emergencies, have violated Article 21 of the “Law of Ukraine on Information”. According to that article, the sources of the information about the governmental activities are the various regulatory acts (incl. “acts of subordinate legislation; non-normative acts of state bodies; acts of bodies of local and regional self-government”). In case of "phosphorus" accident these are the protocols of emergency area examination, independent analysis of the (spilled? ) matter, air composition analysis, etc. Unfortunately, the citizens had no access to any first-hand information. Starting on the second day after the accident, the websites of government bodies published only secondary information – comments of press-secretaries, ministers, executives, stating mostly that “all is normal”, the emergency works are going “according to the plan”, “the content of dangerous matter is within the acceptable concentrations”, etc. However, who knows what is “normal”? And what is the “acceptable concentration” and which matter exactly? That remains the secret.

That means that the right of citizens to information was violated and is being violated still.
The constitutional Article 16 is violated, as “To ensure ecological safety and to maintain the ecological balance on the territory of Ukraine… is the duty of the State”.

The other violated constitutional rights are outlined in Article 50 of the Constitution of Ukraine that reads: “Everyone has the right to an environment that is safe for life and health, and to compensation for damages inflicted through the violation of this right. Everyone is guaranteed the right of free access to information about the environmental situation, the quality of food and consumer goods, and also the right to disseminate such information. No one shall make such information secret.”

The President of the International Women's Human Rights Protection Center “La Strada – Ukraine” Kateryna Levchenko stresses that the last norm has an imperative force and does not foresee any limitations. However the article 9 of the “Law of Ukraine on environment” states that the citizens have the free access to information excluding the limitations set up by the law. The environmentalists had repeatedly focused the attention on this conflict in legislation and also noted the fact of information access limitation is very hard to prove. However that law is still valid.

After the post-accident clean-up was finished, the government official decided to return the remnants of the cargo back to Kazakhstan where it came from and tried to calm down the panicking citizens by stating that the train would be avoiding the big cities on the way back. However the train's route was classified. Hence the question pops up – why the environmental rights of small cities and villages are valued less that these of the big cities? That violates the Article 24 “Citizens have equal constitutional rights”.

As a reaction to the criticism from the President of Ukraine about the unsatisfactory level of public information in the case of "phosphorus" accident the Cabinet of Ministers of Ukraine decided to create the system of public information for emergencies. However nothing really changes in public communications if that system consists of comments by executives and secondary information only and does not reveal the source data and every step and every detail about the emergency; if independent experts are not called to analyze and comment on the situations, then everything will remain “within the normal level” as determined by government bureaucrats.

What the government should have done, but has not? We think that copies of cargo documentation with detailed description of its chemical composition should have been published immediately after the accident. The call for experts to join the workgroups on accident localization should have been published on the Internet ASAP as well. An internet forum should have been set up where all the volunteer experts under their real names from Ukraine and other countries could have publicly discuss the accident and propose the solutions. The publicity and real names impose the element of responsibility for solutions proposed. These proposals would have become the foundation for the government officials’ first decisions about the scope of danger and the first steps on accident localization. A few hours after the accident the results of independent chemical analysis of spilled matter should have been published. That analysis would have been used to correct the initial plan. The maps of aerosol distribution would have been published and the decision whether evacuation of the inhabitants of endangered zone was needed would have been made. The plan of accident localization and liquidation should have been published and the proceedings of its implementation should have been updated periodically and frequently. A phone hotline for the inhabitants of endangered and adjacent areas should have been provided and widely publicized.

For more details contact:
Vyacheslav Khavrus, +38-050-538-38-13, vhavrus@yahoo.com
Kateryna Levchenko, +38-044-205-36-95, lastrada@ukrpack.net