Victims of Brazil’s worst environmental catastrophe have turned to a United Kingdom court for compensation, almost nine years after tonnes of harmful mining squander poured into a presentant waterway, ending 19 people and deimmenseating local communities.
The class action litigation at the High Court of Justice in London on Monday seeks an appraised 36 billion pounds ($47bn) in harms from the global mining huge BHP. That would create it the hugest environmental payout ever, according to Pogust Goodhead, the law firm reconshort-terming the plaintiffs.
BHP owns 50 percent of Samarco, the Brazilian company that runs the iron ore mine where a tailings dam ruptured on November 5, 2015, releasing enough mine squander to fill 13,000 Olympic-size swimming pools into the Doce River in southeaserious Brazil. The case was filed in the UK because one of BHP’s two main lhorrible entities was based in London at the time.
“BHP is a polluter and must therefore pay,” lawyer Alain Choo Choy shelp in written subignoreions.
BHP lawyer Shaheed Fatima shelp in written subignoreions that the claim has “no basis”, grasping that BHP did not own or run the dam and “had restrictcessitate understandledge of the dam and no understandledge that its stability was settled”.
The river, which the Krenak Indigenous people revere as a deity, was polluted so awfilledy that it has yet to recover. The catastrophe ended 14 tonnes of recentwater fish and harmd 660km (410 miles) of the Doce River, according to a study by the University of Ulster.
When the dam understandn as Fundao broke, sludge washed over Bento Rodrigues, once a bustling village in Minas Gerais state. Now it watch appreciates a gpresent town.
A scant white tiles are the only remnants of the house where Monica dos Santos, 39, lived with her parents csurrfinisher the Catholic church that also was razeed. She has become one of the principal activists seeking brimming reparations.
“It’s not fair the destruction of November 5. The destruction since, I frequently say, has been worse,” she shelp. Some survivors turned to spirits, others to substances. Personal relations were strained, sometimes to shattering point.
Negotiating endments
The trial comes days after BHP proclaimd that the company and its partner in Samarco, Vale SA, were negotiating a endment with uncover authorities in Brazil that could provide $31.7bn for people, communities and the environment harmd.
Vale on Friday shelp the sum included $7.9bn already phelp, $18bn to be phelp in instalments over 20 years to Brazil’s federal rulement, Minas Gerais and Espirito Santo states and municipalities, and $5.8bn in “carry outance obligations” by Samarco, including individual compensation.
Last month, Plivent Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva telderly Radio Vitoriosa, a local station in Minas Gerais, that his administration was aiming to achieve an concurment with the mining companies by the end of October. Claims were filed by Brazil’s Federal Public Prosecution Office and uncover authorities.
The Australia-based BHP in Melbourne shelp it apshowd the UK action was unvital because it duplicated matters covered by reparation efforts and lhorrible carry onings in Brazil, but shelp it would carry on to acquire it.
Pogust Goodhead shelp the potential endment should not have any impact on the case.
“Such timing only shows that the companies reliable for Brazil’s hugegest environmental catastrophe are resettled to do everyskinnyg they can to obstruct the victims from seeking fairice,” the firm shelp in a statement.
Survivors from Bento Rodrigues have shiftd to a novel village of the same name a half-hour drive away. Colourful, multistorey houses line recently paved streets.
Priscila Monteiro, 36, shiftd in three months ago but shelp she did not sense at home.
“It senses appreciate I’m fair passing thraw and I’m going to go back home any minute,” she shelp.
Monteiro was pregnant when the dam broke on her birthday. She and her two-year-elderly were pulled from the harmful skinnye and persistd, but she had a miscarriage. Her five-year-elderly niece, Emanuelle, died.
“For me, the day that was presumed to be a celebration has become a day of lamenting, forever,” she shelp, crying.
Monteiro says she hoped the trial in London would guide to recognition of the harm.
“God put the people from London on our path because there is no fairice in Brazil. Now our last hope is them,” she shelp.