Rich world 'behind much of pollution in poor nations'

Rich countries are partly responsible for pollution from poor ones, including poisonous mining discharge, because they buy many of the raw materials and goods that produce the waste, environmental groups said.

"In our part of the world, these problems have been fixed for the most part," said Richard Fuller, founder of the New York-based Blacksmith Institute, which has compiled a database of 600 of the world's worst polluted places.

"We have exported our industry overseas and yet there's no pollution controls in these places or the pollution controls are terribly inadequate."