By Debra Chong
Civil groups and the public have increased their protests against the setting up of a rare earth plant in Pahang and Perak — file pic
In a media statement today, Sustainable Development Network (Susden) of Malaysia president Muhammad Sha’ani Abdullah questioned the Barisan Nasional (BN) government on its sloppy approval of the RM700 million plant being built in Gebeng.
“The question which comes to mind is how such investment and construction application were approved without a rigorous examination,” asked Muhammad Sha’ani, who is also a member of the Human Rights Commission of Malaysia (Suhakam).
“Indeed how the Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) was done and did it not trigger the authorities to investigate in details these concerns,” he added, and condemned Putrajaya for its “indifference against nature and the well-being of Malaysians”.
He pointed to the disastrous Asian Rare Earth (ARE) refinery in Ipoh which has been blamed for the rise of cancer and birth defects in the area some 20 years ago, due to radiation pollution and toxins leaching into the ground.
Lynas says the review will not delay the refinery’s opening scheduled for September. — file pic
“A one-month review on health and safety aspects is, to us, a red herring and a means to tire down as well as side track the citizen’s protests,” he said.
“We are deeply concerned that the said independent study only came about after the initiatives from the citizens, where only then an operating license will be approved,” he added.
Last week, International Trade and Industry Minister Datuk Seri Mustapa Mohamed announced Lynas would be barred from shipping the ore — said to contain low-levels of radioactive thorium — into the country pending the review board’s report on the health, safety and environmental impact to the state.
Lynas can continue building its plant but it will not get a pre-operating license until the month-long independent review is complete, Mustapa added.
The Sydney-based company, however, said the review panel will not slow the start-up of its rare earths refinery, scheduled for September.
The Pahang Bar has called for a year-long review of the plant.
Susden Malaysia urged the government to start acting more responsibly and be transparent by providing full disclosure on the issue of Bukit Merah and Lynas Malaysia so that citizens are informed, and gelling all the different government agencies dealing with approval guidelines as well as monitoring and safety standards.
The non-government organisation also wants the independent review panel to include all stakeholders and table its findings before the public.
“Our economy and development is built on our greatest treasure our natural resources and our people. This failure to ensure a sustainable path is not development but a backlash,” it said.
The rare earths industry is key to a global switch to cleaner energy — from batteries in hybrid cars to magnets in wind turbines.
But mining and processing the metals causes environmental harm that even China, the world’s biggest producer, is no longer willing to bear.
China’s rare earths industry produces more than five times the amount of waste gas, including deadly fluorine and sulphur dioxide, than the total flared annually by all miners and oil refiners in the US, according to a Bloomberg report
Civil groups have stepped up their protests against the plant, including marching on Parliament while in session, prompted by radiation leakages from Japan’s nuclear power plants last month following a massive earthquake and tsunami
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