The BP Gulf disaster is clearly becoming the worst oil spill in U.S. history and is on pace to become one of its worst environmental disasters -- at least as a finite event. But it's useful to remember how exploitative companies and ineffectual regulatory systems have environmentally ravaged other countries as well.
Today, an Indian court finally convicted company officials in the Bhopal, India, gas accident that killed an estimated 15,000 people in 1984. NPR notes that the verdicts are likely to be appealed, making a long, slow-moving case even more so, and called it the result of "India's notoriously slow and ineffective judicial system."
Originally, 12 company officials from U.S.-based Union Carbide were accused. Seven of eight officials based in India were convicted Monday (the other one died in the meantime). Many are in their 70s. If the case drags on further, it's unclear whether any of the victims' loved ones will see justice. It's small comfort, but, in comparison, the U.S. is lucky to have the framework to at least try to hold BP responsible.
-- Monica Potts
