"Bohai legacy highlights weakness in China’s marine law", 26 June 2018

A long and hard-fought lawsuit brought by a group of Chinese tourist operators against United States oil giant ConocoPhillips has quietly ended with an out-of-court settlement behind closed doors...The tourist operators’ case started in November 2012 following the Bohai Bay oil leak in 2011...The leak was China’s worst coastal environmental disaster for years...In April 2012, a final agreement was reached...to pay 1.683 billion yuan into a compensation fund.  The agreement provided compensation for aquaculture and fishing sectors in certain parts of Hebei and Liaoning provinces.  However, Shandong and Tianjin received nothing.  Nor was there any provision for the tourism sector.  There is no public information available detailing if and how the money was distributed by the local provincial authorities.  Having been left out of the compensation deal, and with livelihoods damaged, the Tangshan tourism operators bandied together to seek reparation...One challenge for the claimants was establishing a direct link between the pollution and the losses suffered.  Under Chinese law, the claimant is responsible for providing evidence of the link between the pollution and any resultant losses...All known compensation cases brought as a result of the Bohai oil leak have been protracted and problematic.  A case brought by Tianjin fishermen was rejected by the government courts, and 500 Shandong fishermen are still waiting for their case to be heard.  This reflects the weakness of the Chinese legal system in dealing with oil pollution accidents in the marine environment...Feng Jie, a journalist who reported in depth on the Penglai 19-3 leak, says that current structures are failing to guarantee justice for victims of pollution.  Whilst the enormous environmental costs of the Bohai leak have spurred improvements to China’s marine environmental protection law, legislators still have much to do.