The BOC, Colayco said, showed a certification from the Department of Environment and Natural Resources (DENR) that the 12-meter freight boxes contained “residual waste, not hazardous waste.â€
Citing diplomatic relations, the DENR decided to drop its demand on the Canadian government to take back the trash. That decision happened a month before President Aquino visited Canada on May 6-10.
On the eve of Aquino’s departure, on May 5, Customs Commissioner Alberto Lina issued a memo to retired Maj. Gen. Elmir de la Cruz, BOC district collector at the Manila International Container Port (MICP), saying he had “no objections†to the MICP recommendation to dump the trash in a sanitary landfill at the “earliest time possible.â€
The disposal of the shipment was “pursuant to Section 2608 of the Tariff and Customs Code of the Philippines,†Lina said.
“The mode of disposal will be by way of disinfection/dumping, which shall be undertaken by a BOC-MICP accredited private disposal contractor and that the actual disposal shall be done in the presence of representatives†of agencies like the departments of environment and natural resources, health, foreign affairs and justice as well as the Canadian Embassy and the Manila Regional Trial Court, Lina said. The court earlier directed the BOC to get rid of the trash.
Environmental advocates said the dumping violated the Basel Convention on the Control of Transboundary Movements of Hazardous Waste.
DENR Director Lormelyn Claudio said a waste analysis and characterization study done on Nov. 10, 2014, found that the shipment contained “municipal solid waste.â€
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