At a webinar on June 30, a coalition of 10 non-governmental organizations (NGOs) helped participants better understand the human-caused environmental disasters that are directly caused by human-caused disasters– Taiwan’s Formosa Corporation through an “online tour” to several “places” around the world.
Ms. Kaytlin Joshua, the host of the program, said that the “stops” during the “tour” are places where Formosa has invested in building factories, such as in Vung Ang (Vietnam), Texas (USA), and in Taiwan.
According to Ms. Kaylin, environmental activists said that the company’s business activities have left a devastating impact on the environment and the lives of local people.
As evidence for the above conclusion, Ms. Huiting Hsu said that in her hometown, some researchers have shown a clear correlation between Formosa’s oil companies and cancer rates after 10 years of operation. onion. However, Formosa has found ways to silence critics. She further shared:
“Formosa Plastics later sued a professor who was trying to prove a cause-and-effect relationship between the company’s pollution and people’s disease. This move is seen as the fastest way for Formosa to silence researchers who dare to challenge them.”
Particularly in Ha Tinh (Vietnam), Father Nguyen Hong Linh, the pastor of Dong Son Parish, Ky Nam commune, recently shared with Radio Free Asia what he has witnessed since he returned to the Dong Son parish, about three kilometers from the administrative boundary of Hung Nghiep Formosa Iron and Steel Factory:
“In my parish, about 60% of the deaths were caused by cancers. Certainly, there is no scientific evidence or anyone can prove that the problem of Formosa is the cause of cancer, but seeing that so many people die from cancer, I myself ask the question of how the environment we live in has caused cancer in recent years, the percentage of diseases that lead to so many deaths.”
Presenting the consequences of Formosa in Vietnam, speaker-journalist Nancy Bui said that today, more than five years after the environmental disaster caused by Formosa in four central provinces of Vietnam, people here still suffer the consequences: losing their job, having to leave the country to look for work elsewhere, their families being broken up, their children growing up without a parent beside them, and they have to live in hardship.
Nancy Bui is the Vice President of the Justice Society for the Victims of Formosa, which is providing legal assistance to nearly 8,000 Vietnamese victims in the Formosa case in Taiwan.
And the vehement protests
Formosa Plastics Group is planning to call it the “Sunshine project,” investing $12 billion to build 14 plastic processing plants in St. James, Louisiana, USA, but met strong opposition from the local community and had to postpone the start of construction.
The organizers of the seminar “Formosa Toxic Substances Tour” issued a call for everyone to join the fight against Formosa through a campaign to “denunciate, stop funding and divest” Formosa projects in Louisiana and on around the world.
Michelle Chan of Friends of the Earth explains that Formosa needs to raise $12 billion for the project and will need to rely on banks and this is where activists can attack by denouncing Formosa on social media as well as writing letters via email, Twitter, Facebook to ask banks such as Bank of America, JP Morgan Chase and Wells Fargo to stop funding Formosa:
“Formosa desperately needs these banks, but the banks don’t necessarily need Formosa. So we’re in a great position to work together to put pressure on Wall Street to keep banks away from Project Sunshine.”
Divestment strategies have also been implemented in Taiwan with the support of 10 affiliated organizations for the environment. Nancy Bui said:
“In fact, the Justice Society for the Victims of Formosa is also trying to work in that direction. You must have also heard that Taiwan’s four state-owned banks have given Formosa Ha Tinh $2.5 billion in loans to develop more factories in Vung Ang, Ha Tinh. Organizations have helped the Justice Society for Formosa Victims organize protests and lobbying for the prime minister of Taiwan around April and May. It is also one of the activities of the No Formosa Global group.”
Additionally, activists have also launched a petition calling on US President Joe Biden to direct the revocation of a federal permit for Formosa Plastics to build a petrochemical complex in St. James, Louisiana.
Nancy also added: “If you have the opportunity, please sign it because the success of the group prevents the construction of a new factory in Louisiana, if successful, it is also one of the opportunities to raise other our voice of (Vietnamese) us stronger.”
The organizers ended the seminar with the call to “Stop Formosa.”
Thoibao.de (Translated)
