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Clouds containing 40 tons of deadly methyl isocyanate gas leaked from the Union Carbide plant in Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh state 25 years ago and killed 4,000 people in nearby slums overnight. Over the years, doctors estimate, 15,000 more people have died as a direct result of the accident, with up to hundreds of thousands with impaired health.

Experts say the groundwater and soil is still contaminated. The national government wants to pay for a cleanup, but the state government has denied for years that there is any environmental problem.

Union Carbide paid the Indian government $470 million in a settlement in 1989. The company was later bought by Dow Chemical, which still faces claims, but refuses to acknowledge any responsibility for a company that ceased to exist when it bought it.

Links to other sites: Christian Science Monitor, New York TImes, Voice of America