Blast warehouse owners revealed
Print Edition
THE son of a former police chief is one of two silent owners of the warehouse for hazardous materials in Tianjin where explosions killed at least 114 people, and used his connections to help obtain licenses despite safety violations, Xinhua news agency said yesterday.
The other owner is a former executive at a state-owned chemical company who also used his connections to smooth the way for approval for the facility, Xinhua said in a lengthy report on warehouse company Ruihai International Logistics.
Dong Shexuan, 34, son of the late Tianjin port police chief Dong Peijun, and former Sinochem executive Yu Xuewei hid their stakes in the firm through friends, according to Xinhua.
They are among 10 company executives detained after last week’s explosions.
Dong owned 45 percent of Ruihai through a schoolmate, Xinhua reported. The rest was owned by Yu but held in the name of a friend of his, it said.
It was not immediately clear why Yu wanted to hide his involvement, but Dong told Xinhua he wanted to avoid any appearance of conflict of interest, especially because his father was then under investigation for possible corruption. “The public perception may not be good, given my father’s position with the police,” Dong told Xinhua.
Yu said he enlisted Dong into the company in late 2012 because of his family background, and that Dong was easily able to obtain a fire certificate for the hazmat business. “I brought all the materials for the renovation plans, and the fire certificate was soon issued,” Dong was quoted as saying.
The fire certificate apparently nudged local planning officials to issue Ruihai the building permit for hazmat storage, even though its location would be less than the required 1,000 meters from homes and public roads — a clear violation of state safety rules.
“My connections are in police and fire. When we needed a fire inspection, I went to meet with officials at the Tianjin port fire squad. I gave them the files and soon they gave me the appraisal,” Dong said, according to Xinhua.
Dong said Ruihai also had to clear another seemingly impossible obstacle. A safety evaluation firm had told Ruihai that a satisfactory report was out of the question because of noncompliance with the safety distance. “Yu Xuewei asked me not to worry but leave the matter to him. So he changed the safety evaluation firm and got the report,” Dong told Xinhua.
Around 700 tons of highly toxic sodium cyanide were stored at the site, officials have said.
Xinhua also revealed that the company operated without a license for nine months to June. “After the first license expired, we applied for an extension,” it quoted Yu as saying. “We did not cease operation because we did not think it was a problem. Many other companies have continued working without a license.”
Sinochem has two hazardous chemical warehouses near the site of last week’s blast, according to Greenpeace. It said both violated the law on distance.
Zhu Liming, deputy head of the planning and land management bureau at the Binhai New Area, which granted the land and construction license for the warehouse, said his bureau “referred to the fire safety documents, which had given the green light in terms of whether the warehouse was a safe distance from the residential area.”
At a press conference yesterday, Tianjin Vice Mayor He Shushan said the warehouse had stored about 40 substances across seven categories, including around 1,300 tons of oxide compounds, mainly potassium nitrate and ammonium nitrate; 500 tons of inflammable materials, consisting of metallic sodium and magnesium; and 700 tons of highly toxic substances, mainly sodium cyanide.
As of yesterday afternoon, 150 tons of sodium cyanide had been removed from the core blast area and sent to its manufacturer to be processed, he said.
The blasts had sparked fears over toxic pollutants in the city’s air and water, though authorities have insisted both are safe.
While the blast zone remains contaminated, no unsafe chemical levels have been found in the surrounding area, Bao Jingling, chief engineer of the Tianjin Environmental Bureau, told reporters yesterday.
He said technicians also tested water samples from city streets taken after rainstorms on Tuesday and found no dangerous contamination. Some residents had reported an unusual foamy substance after the rain.
Xinhua’s report supports the common perception that well-connected private Chinese companies use personal relationships with people in the government to override rules.
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