BHOPAL India, Jan. 18. Reuter: Union Carbide appealed on Monday against an Indian court order to pay 270 million dollars in interim compensation to victims of the Bhopal poison gas leak, the world’s worst industrial disaster.
The U.S. multinational said in a statement the order amounted to “a judgment and decree without trial”.
Judge J.W. Deo ordered Union Carbide last December 17 to pay the interim relief while he decided who to blame for the leak which killed more than 2,500 people and injured 200,000 in this central Indian city on December 3, 1984.
A company spokesman said Union Carbide filed a 200page petition with the Madhya Pradesh State High Court in Jabalpur, 300 km from the State capital Bhopal.
The court is scheduled to hear the case on January 21, the spokesman said.
The Indian government is suing the company in the Bhopal district court for 3.3 billion dollars damages over the leak from the pesticides plant.
Union Carbide called the interim compensation order “judgment without evidence, judgment without considering the defenses of Union Carbide Corp. or the Merits of its countersuit against the Indian government”.
The company claims the tragedy was the result of sabotage by a ‘disgruntled employee at the plant, owned by Union Carbide India Ltd. of which the Indian government is a shareholder.
Article extracted from this publication >> January 22, 1988
