The Centre for Environmental Justice together with Sri Lanka Nature Group organised a media event and book launching on the 3rd December 2012 at the HARTI, Colombo to mark the “Global No Pesticides Use Day”.

This day was initiated in 1998, by the Pesticide Action Network to commemorate the world’s worst chemical and industrial disaster in 1984. A Union Carbide pesticide factory in Bhopal(India) exploded and released a lethal gas (methyl isocyanate) that causing more than 500,000 injured and 20,000 deaths in the years since.

A petition signed by the people affected with the Chronic Kidney Disease unidentified etiology (CKDue) handed over to the Ministry of Health and Ministry of Agriculture requesting proper healthcare for the several thousands of CKDue patients and take actions against dirty pesticides. Senior Minister of Science and Technology, Prof Tissa Vitarana joined the occasion.