REPORT / INTERNATIONAL NEWS

European, Turkish and Chinese recyclers are set to benefit from strict new EU rules on breaking up old ships, but the practice of dismantling them on beaches in South Asia - at great human and environmental cost - will still be hard to stop. Of 1,026 ocean-going ships recycled in 2014, 641 were taken apart on beaches in India, Bangladesh and Pakistan, according to figures from the NGO Ship breaking Platform, which campaigns for an end to the hazardous practice. Tankers, cruise liners and other old vessels are rammed onto beaches and stripped down by hundreds of unskilled workers using simple tools such as blowtorches. Chemicals leak into the ocean when the tide comes in.

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http://www.dailymail.co.uk/wires/reuters/article-3019310/EU-ban-owners-scrapping-ships-South-Asian-beaches.html?ITO=1490&ns_mchannel=rss&ns_campaign=1490