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Washington (AFP) Nov 4, 2010 Survivors of world's worst industrial accident at Bhopal, India, appealed Thursday for a meeting with President Barack Obama about corporate accountability when he visits next week. Campaigners said that Bhopal activists would head to New Delhi on Monday to hold a sit-in protest during the visit by Obama, who is on a mission to breathe new life into relations between the world's two largest democracies. In a joint letter requesting a meeting, six activists from Bhopal noted that Obama took "strong steps" to press British oil giant BP to make amends over its spill in the Gulf of Mexico. "Demanding universally applied standards of corporate accountability would be an opportunity for the US government and your administration to put an end to corporate double standards," they wrote in a letter received by AFP in Washington. In December 1984, a pesticide plant run by Union Carbide in the central Indian city spewed toxic gas into surrounding neighborhoods, killing thousands instantly and tens of thousands later. Dow Chemical in 1999 bought Union Carbide, which a decade earlier had struck a 470 million-dollar settlement with the Indian government. Dow said the deal absolved it of further responsibility for medical bills or clean-up. In June, a court sentenced seven Indian managers to two-year jail terms, the first convictions over the 25-year-old tragedy. After public outrage that the sentences were not tougher, India promised to renew efforts to extradite Union Carbide's elderly former boss Warren Anderson, who lives near New York. The Obama administration has tried to play down the renewed activism over Bhopal, saying that the matter should be considered closed in light of the court decision. Larry Cox, executive director of Amnesty International USA, wrote a separate letter to Obama, saying that Bhopal survivors are not receiving needed medical care for persistent health problems. "It is essential that your administration and the government of India cooperate to ensure that those accused of causing the Bhopal disaster, including (Union Carbide), are made to face trial and that Bhopal survivors are able to obtain redress," Cox wrote.
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