The 37 containers were being redirected from Turkey to Vietnam via Greece until the Basel Action Network (BAN) blew the whistle to the Greek authorities, who pulled them off of the ship. The Greek authorities are now waiting for Germany and COSCO to act and order the repatriation of the waste back to the German shippers.

According to BAN, 16 containers holding German plastic wastes had already been shipped by COSCO to Vietnam. Exports of such wastes by Germany to Vietnam, had they been done directly, would have likely been illegal as Germany forbids wastes collected from households to be allowed to be exported to non-OECD countries. 

Further, says BAN, an additional 89 COSCO containers are believed to be detained in Turkey. “It is vital that COSCO not allow these to be exported to third countries, but be sent back directly to Germany in accordance with the Basel Convention rules, which require repatriation when shipments cannot be conducted in accordance with the original contract,” said Jim Puckett, BAN’s Executive Director in Seattle, WA, USA.

According to an industry report on the seizure in Piraeus on 2 December [euwid-recycling.com], prior to arriving in Greece, the plastic waste had been stored in Turkish ports for almost a year. The waste had initially been exported for use as feedstock at a Turkish recycling plant, which lost its operating licence before the shipments were completed. The Turkish authorities had sought, unsuccessfully, to have the plastic waste, which filled around 400 containers, repatriated. The initial German exports took place between November 2020 and February 2021. Having failed to return the waste plastic to Germany, Turkish authorities released the containers for re-export, mainly to Vietnam.

“We are calling on COSCO to guarantee that all of the more than 100 German containers of plastic waste, still sitting in Greece and Turkey, be returned to Turkey and in no way be allowed to be exported to Vietnam or other third country destinations. Industry leaders like COSCO must lead in more than just profit margins,” said Puckett. “They must also serve as role models in matters of environment, social benefit, and global governance.”

In sum in the letter, the environmentalists are calling on COSCO to do the following as a matter of urgency:

• Immediately take steps to declare willingness to assist the German government in returning the containers now in Piraeus and in Turkey to Germany, as is called for in Article 8 of the Basel Convention, and fully cooperate in this repatriation of the plastic wastes.
• Agree to announce a policy of forbidding trade of and screen all Bills of Lading in future for HS codes of 3915 (plastic waste), including subsets in all of its voyages, vessels, and leased or owned containers.
• Take leadership and publish and publicize this policy publicly, while calling on the other major shipping lines listed in BAN’s campaign to do the same.According 

The letter to COSCO sent by the 52 organizations is part of a larger campaign targeting the all of the major shipping lines seeking commitments from each of them to cease exporting plastic wastes.