WASHINGTON (Sputnik) — The US giant Dow Chemical Company must respond to a court summons and show up on Saturday at a court in Bhopal, India in relation to criminal charges on the 1984 gas disaster that killed 22,000 people, Amnesty International said in a press release.
"Dow must stop dodging the Indian justice system and ignoring survivors who have suffered from the toxic fallout of the disaster for over three decades now," Amnesty International India Business and Human Rights Officer Aruna Chandrasekhar said in the release on Friday.
The 1984 gas leak at a pesticide plant in Bhopal owned by the Union Carbide Corporation killed more than 22,000 people and exposed over 570,000 to damaging levels of toxic gas.
In 2001, Dow acquired Union Carbide Corporation. However, Dow has failed to respond to calls for reparations from the victims and survivors of the disaster, according to the release.
Dow announced a $130 billion all-stock merger with another US chemical giant, DuPont, last week, with the combined company to be named DowDuPont.
