b asel

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turn back the toxic tide
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A Program of Earth Economics

n etwork 122 S. Jackson St., Suite 320

Seattle, Washington 98104
Telephone 206 652-5555 Web: www.ban.org

Tuesday, October 7, 2008

Competent Authority of Malaysia for Basel Convention

Ms. Siti Zaleha Ibrahim

Principal Assistant Director
Department of Environment
Level 2, Block 4G3, Precinct 4, Federal Podium
Government Administrative Centre
62574 Putrajaya
Malaysia
Tel: (+60 3) 8871 21 34

Dear Ms. Siti Zaleha Ibrahim:

I hope this letter finds you in good health and spirits. As you know, the Basel Action Network
is a civil society organization concerned with supporting compliance with the Basel Convention
and the Basel Ban Amendment and generally preventing toxic trade. We are happy to note that
Malaysia, one of the first Asian countries to ratify the Basel Ban Amendment, has an excellent
history of working actively with the global community and nationally to prevent global dumping
of toxic waste.

Today we write about the subject of electronic waste trade from the United States to Malaysia
and in particular in regards to cathode ray tube glass which is listed in the Basel Convention as
A2010: Glass waste from cathode ray tubes and other activated glass, that is finding its way to
Malaysia’s Samsung Corning Sdn. Bhd. factory for CRT manufacture in Negeri Sembilan,
Malaysia and perhaps other locations.

We are aware that Malaysia has been granting official permissions for importation of cathode
ray tube waste glass from the United States to Samsung. We have also heard about whole tubes
being imported to another Party in Malaysia that processes these tubes, before sending to
Samsung. All of these imports raise serious questions that need to be resolved with respect to
Malaysia’s obligations under the Basel Convention.

Mr. Richard Gutierrez of our Asia / Pacific office of BAN recently discussed with you in
Bangkok, the situation regarding this CRT waste. It was his understanding that Samsung
Corning was allowed a temporary permit to import such waste despite a national ban on
hazardous waste importation in general. This temporary permit was due to expire in 2010.
While such consent can be granted from the national laws of Malaysia for Basel Parties around
the world, and that is Malaysia’s right to grant such exceptions to the national ban, it is not
likewise possible to do this for a non-Party such as the United States as such trade is not in
compliance with Basel rules.

As you are no doubt aware, the Basel Convention in Article 4, Paragraph 5, stipulates that: A
Party shall not permit hazardous wastes or other wastes to be exported to a non-Party or to be
imported from a non-Party.

Thus any imports of a Basel listed hazardous or other waste must not be imported from the
United States (a non-party) to Malaysia. To import such material does in fact constitute illegal
traffic and is a criminal offence under the Convention. In this case we see that Malaysia is
permitting such imports, which appears constitutes non-compliance with the Convention. This
is a matter, which if left unaddressed; we should all take most seriously.

BAN wishes to work with Malaysia to set this right if indeed a mistake is being made. In this
regard, we stand ready to work with Malaysia should it wish to explore legal ways to import
such material for glass to glass CRT recycling. There are two legal avenues for exploration, one
of which we could agree to support and one we could not support.

First, there is the possible use of an Article 11 bilateral agreement to import waste from the
United States. BAN would strongly recommend not pursuing this route as a precedent of
utilizing Article 11 to circumvent the Basel Ban Amendment is legally questionable and
certainly highly contentious. Any bilateral agreement to be signed between an OECD country
and a non-OECD country that sees hazardous waste flowing toward the non-OECD country
would be a very dangerous precedent and one which we would oppose strongly.

However, BAN believes that properly prepared and cleaned CRT glass cullet could logically and
safely be de-listed from Annex VIII and moved to Annex IX of the Convention. We could see
this as a way forward if the cullet was first cleaned of all phosphor, silica and other dusts to
prevent occupational exposure and generation of residual hazardous waste from harmful dusts, is
properly packaged and only receives quality control treatment (e.g. to remove metal bits and
other impurities) prior to going directly into the glass furnaces as a feed stock. In such case, it
will not contain dispersible hazardous constituents and as it will not be going directly to further
recycling processing but will be directly fed as a raw material into a primary production unit, we
could support a listing in Annex IX.

Such a listing could read: B2010 Crushed glass or cullet from leaded cathode ray tube glass,
cleaned of all phosphor and silica and lead dust and destined for glass to glass manufacturing
with no further processing required other than quality control (ie. removal of impurities other
than phosphor and dust).

BAN stands ready to support this amendment to the Convention if Malaysia would submit this.
We believe other countries experienced in amendments to the annexes, such as Germany would
also be supportive in this process. In this way, properly prepared and cleaned CRT cullet can be
considered as a non-waste or a non-hazardous waste and therefore can be imported from any
country in the world regardless of whether or not they are Parties of the Basel Convention. This
would be a way to become compliant with the Basel Convention.
BAN views this matter as one of urgency. Vast amounts of CRT glass, much of it completely
uncleaned, and even whole CRT tubes are currently on their way each month to Malaysia from
the US on container ships. This importation appears to be illegal with respect to the Basel
convention obligations

We therefore strongly recommend the following course of action:

1. Imports of CRT glass from the United States (a non-Party) cease at once unless Malaysia
ensures that such waste is cleaned of all dispersible hazardous material (dusts and
phosphors) and that the material will go directly for processing in a primary glass furnace
as a feedstock and Malaysian legal experts can agree that this can be considered a non-
waste not subject to the Basel Convention despite the B2010 listing.

2. Malaysia work immediately with other Basel Parties (e.g. Germany) to propose an
amendment to the Annexes of the Convention along the lines we have suggested above.
This amendment is absolutely necessary to provide global clarity and a level playing
field with respect to this waste stream.

In this way, we can preserve glass to glass recycling to manage society’s transition from CRT
technology in a sustainable way and we can also maintain compliance with international law.
Currently however, Malaysia has not required the pre-cleaning of dispersible hazardous silica
and phosphor dust and it is unclear if Malaysian legal experts consider the material going to
Samsung as a non-waste.

It is my hope that you will copy this letter to any persons within the Malaysian government that
are currently part of the proceedings that has led to consent being given to such imports from the
United States. These persons need to know that such importation is currently likely to be
illegal.

We hope that Malaysia can move quickly to undertake the steps proposed in this letter. In BAN
we are bound by our charter to denounce and work to prevent non-compliance in the strongest
way we can. However we also wish to work with countries to achieve compliance, particularly
with countries that clearly believe in doing the right thing -- as Malaysia has demonstrated many
times in the past.

Thank you very much in advance for your considered response.

Sincerely yours,

Jim Puckett, Coordinator

Basel Action Network

cc. (please forward) Dr. AB. Rahman Bin Awang, Office of Director General of
Environmental Quality
Hon. Mdm. Maznah Mazlan, Deputy Minister, Ministry of Natural Resources and
Environment