Pollution crimes an illegal industry worth millions, says Interpol report

About 19 out of 195 Interpol member countries, including India, contributed to the report by sharing details of their pollution crimes or expertise.

Pollution crimes have turned into a multi-million-dollar illegal industry with “organised crime networks” and “mafia clans” operating at international level, according to a new report by Interpol on Organized Crime-Pollution Crime (OC-PC) nexus.

Interpol has identified document fraud, tax evasion and money laundering as key components of modus operandi in pollution crimes. (Representational photo)

The strategic report, released last week, pointed at coexistence of two parallel phenomena worldwide – shifting of legitimate companies in the environmental compliance sector towards illegal business practices and committing of pollution crime to increase profits, and expansion and/or diversifying of illicit business by organized criminal groups to infiltrate the waste management sector and other profitable markets involving environmentally sensitive commodities.

About 19 out of 195 Interpol member countries, including India, contributed to the report by sharing details of their pollution crimes or expertise. An in-depth analysis of 27 pollution crime cases, majority of them from European countries, concluded that organized crime-pollution crime nexus is a global phenomenon, involving a wide variety of perpetrators and organizational structures.

In the absence of an internationally agreed definition, Interpol refers to “pollution crime” as an umbrella term describing a range of criminal activities involving trafficking and/or illegal management of potential contaminants, and resulting in environmental pollution such as waste crime, marine pollution, fuel, oil and gas smuggling, setting up of illegal refineries, illegal use and trade of chemicals and plastic, and carbon trading crime.

Interpol has identified document fraud, tax evasion and money laundering as key components of modus operandi in pollution crimes.

The report, seen by HT, pegged the combined proceeds of 27 pollution crime cases to a whopping half a billion US dollars. Of the 27 cases, 22 were related to waste crimes, particularly waste trafficking/illegal dumping, two were related to illegal mining, two pertaining to fraud and one was of racketeering associated with breach of environmental regulation.

“Illegal pollution is a highly profitable and serious crime, with devastating consequences for communities, the environment, legitimate businesses and the rule of law. In the cases examined by the Interpol report, the proceeds of the pollution offences ranged from $175,000 to $58 million, corresponding to an average of $19.6 million for each case,” the international policy body said.

“The proceeds of the 27 pollution crime cases combined are estimated to amount to half a billion US dollars. Equally alarming are the costs to clean up and decontaminate illegal pollution sites, which ranged from $6 million to $37 million ($15.6 million on average) according to the cases examined,” it added.

Stressing that OC-PC nexus represents a threat to many countries, the report said: “Organized criminal groups of any size have been found involved in cases of pollution crime in many countries worldwide, with illicit operations ranging from local activities to large-scale intercontinental trafficking worth millions USD.”

Pollution offenders are innovative, adaptive and at times sophisticated in their methods of operation, the Interpol said. “In most cases analysed, suspects were organized in the form of flexible groups or networks, with the ability to infiltrate several different industries and markets where environmentally sensitive commodities are involved. This includes the agricultural, construction, energy, mining and waste management markets, among others,” it said.

Of the pollution crimes analysed by the Interpol, 19 had transnational links while eight were domestic crimes. Seven cases witnessed the involvement of large crime syndicates, the report said.

The report referred to a case wherein Spanish authorities unearthed a syndicate involved in illegal trading of waste tires across 18 European, West African and South American countries. Similarly, in another case, German authorities identified 19 companies based in the country and 184 businesses in West Africa cooperating on waste smuggling.

Citing a case of the UK, Interpol said organized crime groups illegally exported municipal waste from Britain and dumped it in Poland, fraudulently claiming to dispose of the waste in legitimate UK-based sites, as they were paid to do. This illegal dumping resulted in estimated 30-40 waste fires in Poland.

The Interpol also found that a key characteristic of pollution criminality is the capacity of those involved to penetrate the public sector and local politics.

“Some public sector accomplices actively participate in the commission of the offences to share profits and benefits. Other corrupted public officials facilitate the criminal activity by providing confidential information or by containing enforcement,” it said.

The Interpol recommended national law enforcement agencies to prioritise pollution crimes and shift from reactive to a proactive approach when investigating them domestically.