looks at how old ships are torn apart, often illegally and south asia while i'm pulling, putting lives at risk. i'm in is if you're watching dw news to stay with us, the

. this is one of the most dangerous jobs in the world ship breaking and bundle. dish workers here, this colossal structure of the parts so that the materials can be reused or re sold, that exposes them to spontaneous explosions, fall in chunks of steel and toxic materials on the to say, i'm not as best as i say. the thing gave me get low and still a huge number of ships are dismantled in yards like these ones they're out of use. most vessels that are scrapped originally belonged to companies in europe, east asia and south east asia, and 80 percent of their scrap ends up on these 3 beaches and bangladesh, india, and pockets on and many cases illegally. a long chain of pretty actors make this possible. but how does this chain work? what's in it for the shipping companies? and is there a way out

a you may not notice it in your day to day life, but ships are everywhere. know really about 90 percent of our goods are transported over the waves and the volume is only set to increase. it doesn't matter whether ships carry containers, oil, or gas tanks, they pretty much are all made up and filled with hazardous materials. think asbestos lead mercury or pc be switched very simply. speaking are human created. chemicals often found in paint and cable insulation. they were faced out in many places because they can be super toxic and take a long time to break down into environments. but old vessels can still contain pcb . so ideally ship should be recycled in a way that safely contains and dispose of these dangerous materials. for example, on dry dogs, many ports already have them as part of their infrastructure and could repurpose them for recycling. but that's not how things go and shout to run bangladesh. this is the world's number one destination for end of life,

ship parts. in 2020 to 443 commercial ships and offshore units for sold for scrap. more than a 3rd of the growth tonnage, which is used to measure a ship's internal volume ended up in bangladesh. indian park is done foreclosed runners up in all 3 of these destinations, ship bridge, and yards, mostly use a method called beaching. when you sell a ship full steam onto the sand and then it's broken apart into the, on the beach, that means toxic waste and toxic chemicals are being dumped directly into the water into the sand. this is julia black and her a senior bangladesh research research human rights watch. there's no way to safely beach a shift and break it apart. that is environmentally sustainable or safe for workers effect spread beyond the yard. the toxic waste seeps into the ocean and effects marine life. it also makes its way into farmers fields a close to the bangladesh. she facilities,

our shops that sell furniture and stoves made from scrap as best as yeah, asbestos exposure to this mineral famously increases the risk of developing some of the most aggressive forms of cancer. the thing is, shipping companies know all about those. the conditions in the yards in bangladesh, in india and pakistan is an open secret. then why do so many of them send their old vessels there? well, the yards on south asian beaches pay a lot or money for these all these kind of safer facility. after all, being safe costs, money, fair wages, proper working equipment, disposing of hazardous material and then environmentally friendly way. ship breaking your. it's simply skip out on these costs. that means they have more money to offer for old vessels that they can take a part and whose materials they can. so it's an incredibly lucrative business and a place with a booming market for scraps deal. half of the steel used in bangladesh comes from the yards of chatter ground, and the ship reeking industry contributes about $2000000000.00 us dollars. so the

country's economy. so it's under your, it's interest to offer high prices for scraps to attract form business. and it's in foreign companies interests to sell their old vessels for more money than they would get them to you. for example, simply meant sort of profit nickel. i'm really, norris works with the n g o ship breaking platform, a coalition of organizations fighting abuse us and the ship breaking industry for another exercise ships we're looking at the, the forensic get of a 345, $6000000.00. if you asked me, those are peanuts for at baker corporations and they do not justify externalizing costs to the communities in the environment. what these richer countries are doing is very much illegal and then breaks multiple international laws like the boss will convention which the belief that hazardous waste from you or over to the countries cannot be transferred to any other countries. so basically it's meant to stop the rich nations from dumping their trash and poorer parts of the world. that includes

ships that are ready for recycling. companies can avoid that though by not the clearing their ships is waste when they leave the port. the european union has a regulation that goes even further, and we're partnerships with a new flag to be recycled at an e you approve facility which yards like these are not of course. but that's where the street comes in, changing the flag of the ship. so the laws don't apply anymore. there's a whole business around private agencies selling their countries flags. and they're usually places that are known for not exactly implementing maritime law, panama, liberia, and the marshall islands are by far the top 3 flag registries in the world. but there are also other countries registry stutter, especially popular for end of life. ships are as follows, genevas, dividing, or even a small island located to off the coast of australia that physical space as a much cheapest risers are under expect that these end of life flags with

a promise of so closing ice in front of the violations of regional international market, i'm going to use lation. this is a way for small states with few revenue streams to make easy money. the lower buyers in with single voyages for demolition and same day turnaround. but usually it's not the shipping companies themselves to jump on these deals. they need to cover their tracks after all. so before they declared their old vessels, the scrap the palm them off to middleman, the so called cash buyers prepared the ships for an end of life voyage 2 yards where they're not supposed to go. the cash buyer will often times take responsibility for, you know, changing the flag of the ship and changing its name and changing, and the registered owner. so then in the last month, that sort of changes into an entirely new ship and as sent into a bundle dash to w is. asia team obtained

a document that shows just that in this letter of credit to import a ship into bangladesh. the vessel arrives in the country under the name of m d hot seat and it plays the flag of tomorrows, but his previous name was quoterush and it originally had a multi flag. at this point, you might be wondering how can this happen without anyone doing anything to stop it? simply speaking the body in charge of setting standards as the you and the international maritime organization, or hmo and authorities and member states must enforce them. as we've seen. that's a mass of issue. it is often the case that a certain flock states do not have the capacity or the will, the political will to enforce. the standards that have been adopted by the mo, michael's order yanna is an independent expert on toxic waste in human rights for the un. she wrote a whole report on the i am a because lex registration is

a form of business, registering a vessel means money into a treasury, and there is another problem. the international maritime organization has for many years been seen as a catering to the interests of the shipping industry. a major point of critique is the countries that make it easy to register for a flag has disproportionate influence over imo decisions. the organization, spokes person told us everyone has equal influence, since every member state only has one vote. but the issue transparency international accuse of the aisle of waiting votes differently. it says i am o decisions come into force once enough members for presenting a certain percentage of punish and the see you have agreed. so if you look at this convention, the country signing onto it need to represent 40 percent of the world's merchant shipping by gross tonnage. that means that the vote of a country with more ships under its flags like panama holds more weight than that

of a country with fewer ships. the decision and we just saw happens to deal with ship recycling, the hong kong convention, which will come into force in 2025 was drafted. so there would be minimum standards on sustainable ship breaking campaigners where it would override the basel convention, which deals with waste. remember the one from before that and so stop bridge, countries from dumping their trash and coordination, but active as of slammed the hong kong convention for being weaker. for example, it does not outright prohibit end of life ships containing hazardous materials from going to a country that cannot handle that waste and environmental the friendly way. and critics say, if the hong kong convention were to move things forward from the regulations, we have now it would ban or at least discourage the beaching method. now it does neither the convention with essentially green washington and green latham ships onto the beach. okay, and we've talked a lot about the role of international shipping companies and regulators, but what about the bangladesh should government?

when we covered this topic before many of you pointed the finger at local authorities, the psych you have the government of butler, this is just gated to the needs of the developed countries. we're looking for a place where they can dump their toxic fest, sorry. there is one of her son is an environmental attorney from bangladesh. shift . i'm taking the ship, bringing yards to court since 2003. as a result, there have been several rulings trying to enforce labor and environmental standards . what has happened is on paper it now looks much cremaster, but things have not improved. in reality, the standards may be better, but according to a song, there's also no legal requirement for national agencies to monitor if the rules are actually being met. for example, to check if the paperwork listing would hazardous materials or in a vessel was forged. the government has appointed some safety agents. their in most cases relate dupes of the she breakfast and they do

not have the technical expertise. sylvia nash investment enters based on the funds document. there is no legal obligation on the national level of safety agents to dig deeper into issues. there is no denying that bundle of dish has a problem with poor governance on this issue. but what many experts stress is that this poor governance is also fueled by mass of demand from foreign companies that actually have the means to recycle their ships elsewhere. and there is an international market for this sort of lies in green washing. this is a typical case of toxic colonialism. so when we talk about tackling the problem, we need to put pressure on every single actor, the method to dismantle ship safely already exists. the question is how to eliminate some of the loopholes companies like to use to get out of using it. i actually think this is one of the like areas where there is hope in part because

there's very distinct and clear solutions. for example, in the you that would mean applying a chip, recycling regulation to the vessels, original owner, and not to the flag state. so you ship owners could not simply change the flag to resolve their way up to the blocks rules. if the company sells the ship human rights watch the just still applying the regulation to the previous owner for another 2 years that you will reevaluate its regulation by spring 2024. and the european commission told us that the issue of re flagging before dismantling is on its radar human rights spots also proposals for the you to implement a return scanner. that would mean having all ships trading and the water is paid towards the font. and owners only get this money back if the ship goes to a say for cycling facility when it's out of use kind of like the deposit people in germany need to pay on bottles to incentivize them to return it for recycling. on a more international level, you and special rubber tour or the young over commence amending to hong kong

convention, to crack down on beaching and human rights abuses. finally, to bangladesh. here the government has to shut down, shut, breaking yards on the beaches and it will feel more pressure to do so if foreign companies will be forced to stop sending their vessels, their, you know, developed country shouldn't be happy with standards that did sams themselves really lot improve in the part of the world threatening all of these actors. profits is vital because when there's a whole industry around skirting regulations, everyone makes money. the companies who want a higher profit, the cash buyers, the flag agencies and the yard owners, the people paying the price for this are the ones working on these dangerous facilities or living near them. are reality international companies like to hide by passing the responsibility onto middleman? and this is possibly the darkest page in the shipping industry. but these,

the yet so known to most of the people, but doing justice remains visible to people in bangladesh. so what do you think is the best way to stop this foreign companies from sending their vessels to the ship breaking yards? let us know in the comments and don't forget to subscribe to our channel. here at the munich security conference has plenty of security and conflict to worry the politicians and experts. so how does the world reach that dangerous inflection point? my guess this week has been the case of experience has the highest political levels in the us. she's california congress, woman and former speaker of the house of representatives, nancy pelosi and gaza. the us is one that israel has killed 5 to many palestinians, but is jerusalem listening? how will funding for ukraine? clear the kind of luck in the us congress. and this president, 5.