US Worried About Ties With India After Bhopal Verdict

By Chidanand Rajghatta

Bhopal gas tragedy: No question of re-opening case, says US

Washington, Jun 8 : The United States on Monday said it hoped the Bhopal gas tragedy case will not inhibit its growing ties with India or affect the nuclear liability bill currently before the Indian parliament, and that the verdict in the matter ''brings some closure to the families of the victims of the tragedy.''

In uniform reactions to the sentencing of seven Indian employees to two years in prison each more than 25 years after the tragedy caused by the American company, US officials said they did not expect the verdict to open any new inquiry.

''On the contrary, we hope that this is going to help to bring closure,'' Robert Blake, the US state department official overseeing South Asia, said of the tragedy which eventually claimed more than 15,000 lives.

The return of the Bhopal tragedy to the headlines is evidently worrying the Obama administration, going by the almost identical reactions from Blake and the State Department spokesman, suggesting the subject figured in the morning meetings at Foggy Bottom. The Indian verdict, which shocked many still angered by the US parent company escaping criminal liability, is particularly poignant considering that Washington, amid much anger in the US administration, is weighing criminal charges against British Petroleum for the oil spill off the Louisiana coast in an episode that claimed 11 lives.

In an NBC interview to be aired on Tuesday, President Obama said he had been talking to experts about the BP disaster because he wants to know ''whose ass to kick.'' But in the Bhopal tragedy, which occurred more than 25 years ago, the key people bolted a long time ago and escaped an ass-kicking.

Union Carbide’s chairman at the time of the disaster, Warren Anderson, now 89, lives in seclusion in Long Island, New York, and is unreachable. Activists who have ambushed him in the years since he went into hiding variously report him as being deaf and senile. US officials also appeared to dismiss the possibility of his extradition now. ''The question of extradition — as a matter of policy, we never discuss extradition.

So I can't comment on that,'' Blake said.
Asked if the Bhopal case isn’t already inhibiting the Indian parliament from passing the nuclear liability bill, State Department spokesman P.J.Crowley said the Indian parliament will have to make a judgment on the matter, ''but this criminal case should have no relation to the liability legislation currently before the parliament.''

''We just had a strategic dialogue with India. Our countries are closely connected. Our economies are increasingly closely connected. So I certainly would hope that this particular case does not inhibit the continuing expansion of economic, cultural, and political ties between our two countries. We fully expect this will not be the case,'' Crowley said.

Meanwhile, in a late evening email response to ToI, a spokesman for Union Carbide maintained that ''by requirement of the Government of India, the Bhopal plant was detail designed, owned, operated and managed on a day-to-day basis by Union Carbide India Limited (UCIL) and its employees,'' and ''all the appropriate people from UCIL — officers and those who actually ran the plant on a daily basis — have appeared to face charges.''

"Union Carbide and its officials were not part of this case since the charges were divided long ago into a separate case.

Furthermore, Union Carbide and its officials are not subject to the jurisdiction of the Indian court since they did not have any involvement in the operation of the plant, which was owned and operated by UCIL,'' Tomm F. Sprick, Director of Union Carbide Information Center, said in the email.