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Page 4 n THE ASIAN REPORTER ASIA / PACIFIC March 20, 2017 Lawyers sue Chinese authorities for not getting rid of smog POLLUTION PUSHBACK. Commuters, some wearing masks, walk to a subway station during the evening rush hour in Beijing. The city’s average read- ing of the tiny particulate matter PM2.5 — considered a good gauge of air pollution — is seven times what the World Health Organization considers safe. A group of Chinese lawyers is suing the governments of Beijing and its surrounding regions for not doing enough to get rid of smog. (AP Photo/Andy Wong) By Louise Watt The Associated Press EIJING — Lawyer Cheng Hai has an itemized list of compensation demands from Beijing authorities over the city’s smog: 65 yuan ($9) for having to buy face masks, 100 yuan ($15) for seeing a doctor for a sore throat, and 9,999 yuan ($1,500) for emotional distress. Fed up with what they consider halfhearted efforts to fight air pollution, Cheng and like-minded lawyers are putting China’s legal system to the test by suing the governments of the capital and its surrounding regions. “Some people might think that air pollution is inevitable with economic development, but they are wrong,” said Cheng, 64. “We have laws to protect air quality, and major pollution can be avoided if they are fully enforced.” The lawsuits demonstrate the mounting frustration of China’s middle class at the country’s notoriously bad air, a topic that is expected to be discussed at the upcoming annual meeting of the country’s parlia- ment three years after Premier Li Keqiang declared a “war on pollution” at the same event. The dissatisfaction comes even as authorities in the capital are closing factories, getting rid of coal-fired boilers, and taking older, heavier-polluting vehicles off the road. Official data show those measures are having some effect, with Beijing showing year-on-year improvements since 2013. Yet the city’s average reading of the tiny particulate matter PM2.5 — considered a good gauge of air pollution — is still seven times what the World Health Organiza- tion considers safe. “We are the victims of smog and we are entitled to ask for an apology and com- pensation from the government,” said another of the lawyers, Yu Wensheng, 50, from Beijing. The suits, which accuse authorities of failing to deal effectively with the smog, are important to show that the government is not above the law, said Yu. “If the government is not restricted by B law, then what else can restrict it?” said Yu, who has spent time in detention ac- cused of supporting Hong Kong pro-de- mocracy protests in 2014 and for speaking up in support of detained rights lawyers. Along with Beijing, the group has attempted to sue the neighboring province of Hebei and the port city of Tianjin. The region generally suffers the worst pollution in China and forms a front line in the central government’s battle against the scourge. The lawyers say their cases are more about drawing attention to government inaction rather than winning a settlement. China is grappling with serious pollu- tion resulting from three decades of breakneck growth that vastly improved living standards for many, but took a disastrous toll on the environment. As people became more aware of the health issues associated with smog, the declaration of a “war on pollution” at the National People’s Congress in 2014 resulted in measures to reduce pollutants in the air, including capping coal con- sumption. However, a particularly heavy bout of smog at the beginning of this year still triggered pollution “red alerts” in more than 20 cities. Beijing plans to spend $2.7 billion on fighting air pollution this year, part of which would be used to close or upgrade more than 3,000 polluting factories, re- place the use of coal with clean energy on the outskirts of the city, and phase out 300,000 high-polluting older vehicles, ac- cording to the city’s acting mayor, Cai Qi. Despite efforts to enlist the public in the anti-pollution struggle, China’s authori- tarian Communist government heavily discourages protests and other forms of independent action, and at least one of the initial five lawyers in the case appears to have withdrawn his lawsuit under pressure from local authorities. The Beijing press office said the govern- ment hadn’t received any notices about the lawsuits and was unable to comment. The governments of Hebei and Tianjin didn’t respond to requests for comment. The Ministry of Environmental Pro- tection has been sending out inspection teams to check on how well local govern- ments are implementing smog control measures. It was recently announced that the lists of companies that have to halt production during periods of heavy pollution drawn up by three lower-level governments under Beijing and Hebei included companies that were already no longer operating. A Beijing court has already twice rejected attempts by the lawyers to file cases, while a court in Hebei province’s capital, Shijiazhuang, has yet to respond to a case filed more than two months ago. Similar attempts to file suits in previous years have also been derailed, and while a change in the law has allowed some environmental non-governmental organi- zations to bring cases against polluters since 2015, they are discouraged to do so by the high costs of investigating and proving environmental damage, and potential threats and harassment from those they’re suing. Wang Canfa, the director of a center that helps people bring lawsuits relating to pollution, said it would be difficult for the plaintiffs to establish a link between the governments’ actions and the harm they have suffered. “In this circumstance, the governments are not the ones that inflict harm, rather it is the companies that discharge emissions, and individuals who drive cars, who are the polluters,” said Wang, who teaches at the China University of Political Science and Law. Still, the lawyers appear to feel it’s worth the risks and frustrations to make their point. Another of them, Lu Tingge, who filed the Hebei case, said his mother suffers respiratory illnesses and the pollution makes it difficult for her to breathe. He’s asking for 10 yuan ($1.50) in com- pensation for masks, 5,000 yuan ($730) for “spiritual damage,” and an official apology for the harm to his life and work. “I know my chances of winning are small,” said Lu, 47. “But I just want to make people understand that the government bears the main responsibility for dealing with smog and air pollution.” Associated Press researcher Yu Bing contributed to this report. See related story on page 11. Stanford doctors train EMTs in a country with few paramedics By Binaj Gurubacharya The Associated Press ATHMANDU, Nepal — When Subhash Dhungel’s father passed out, the panicked road engineer called for an ambulance. To the Nepali man’s horror, the vehicle arrived without a trained medical technician to help his unconscious father as they drove to a Kathmandu hospital. It wasn’t an isolated case. Nepal is woefully short of ambulances and trained emergency medical technicians (EMTs) are even rarer. Ambulances are mainly used as a means to simply transport patients to hospitals. Now a group of doctors from Stanford University have trained four dozen EMTs in the hope they can gradually transform the Himalayan nation’s emergency services. The team trained 48 EMTs for 12 weeks from December to February. The last such training they did in Nepal was in 2011. “It is helpful to have people get to the hospital quickly, but there is no difference between the ambulance and a taxi if the person is not really trained to use equip- ment to save lives on the way,” said Rebec- ca Walker, a Stanford University emer- gency medicine professor and team leader. The trainees learned about providing first aid, treating trauma and heart patients, and even delivering babies. “There is little or no public awareness about EMTs in Nepal and ambulances in K Nepal generally do not have oxygen bottles, back boards, or any trained EMTs,” said Binod Thapa, a critical-care manager who underwent the training despite having already worked for 17 years at a prominent hospital in Kathmandu. Only three private hospitals and one nonprofit group, the Nepal Ambulance Service, in the nation of 26.4 million people have ambulances with EMTs on board. The capital, Kathmandu, is routinely gridlocked in massive traffic jams and mountains make up most of the country’s terrain, so it takes a long time for ambu- lances to reach hospitals. A lack of trained staff on board to perform emergency life-saving procedures greatly decreases the chance of survival for patients. Dhungel said his family had expected to find at least one trained medical techni- cian in the ambulance who could perform cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR). There was none. EMT TRAINING. An ambulance is seen parked outside a hospital in Kathmandu, Nepal. Nepal is woefully short of ambulances and trained emergency medical technicians (EMTs) who can man them. Now a group of doctors from Stanford University are train- ing four dozen EMTs in the hope they can gradually transform the Himalayan nation’s emergency services. (AP Photo/Niranjan Shrestha) “Eventually we reached the hospital. It was OK, but imagine the situation if somebody really needs CPR,” he said, describing his father’s emergency in 2010. The prospect of having trained emer- gency technicians on board ambulances is a huge leap for Nepal’s capital where until a few years ago there was no centralized number to call for an ambulance, leaving people to dial individual hospitals in the hope they had a vehicle available. It was only in 2011 that the Nepal Ambulance Service began operations in Kathmandu with a three-digit phone number and five ambulances. “Now we have realized the importance of having EMTs who can make the difference between a patient living and dying before reaching the hospital,” said Sita Koirala, who works at a community health center in a mountain village northwest of Kath- mandu and was part of the training. Go paperless! Read The Asian Reporter – exactly as it’s printed here – online! Visit <www.asianreporter.com> and click the “Online Paper (PDF)” link to view our last two issues.
