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Basic Chartered targeted in complaint over coal plant financing

Environmental and human rights groups have filed a complaint with a British government mediation body versus Standard Chartered over its funding of four coalfired power plants in the Philippines, the groups told on Thursday.

The Philippine Movement for Climate Justice, Inclusive Advancement International (IDI), Option and BankTrack implicate Requirement Chartered of breaching the rights of regional communities by funding the operations and are asking it to assist compensate those impacted and strengthen its related policies.

Local neighborhoods have suffered forced expulsions, loss of livelihoods, air- and water pollution-related respiratory and skin diseases, and intimidation and violence, that could have been avoided by efficient bank due diligence, the groups said.

The grievance was submitted with Britain's National Contact Point for Accountable Business Conduct (NCP), a government unit that examines breaches of the OECD Guidelines for Multinational Enterprises, a structure for businesses to run responsibly.

Requirement Chartered decreased to comment when gotten in touch with by . The NCP did not right away return ask for comment.

While the NCP can not oblige Basic Chartered to pay or act settlement, Britain's export credit agency has said it will consider NCP findings when picking support companies and banks in the funding of jobs.

An overall of 51 nations have up until now set up an NCP. In Australia, ANZ Bank accepted compensate Cambodian communities displaced by a sugar business it assisted financing after going through a comparable procedure.

Requirement Chartered knew or ought to have understood that these coal plants would wreck the environment and trigger major harm to local communities, however it funded them anyway and after that overlooked our repeated demands to contribute to remediation efforts, said IDI Executive Director David Pred in a declaration.

(source: Reuters)