Claimants said that the waste caused injuries, deaths, miscarriages and birth defects [AFP]

Under the deal, which sees Transfigura pay the claimants nearly $50m, the alleged victims have accepted that there was no link between the deaths, injuries or miscarriages suffered and exposure to the waste, the company said.

In a joint statement issued late on Saturday, Transfigura and Leigh Day and Co, a British law firm representing the plaintiffs, said more than 20 independent experts had examined the case.

"These independent experts are unable to identify a link between exposure to the chemicals released from the slops and deaths, miscarriages, still births, birth defects, loss of visual acuity or other serious and chronic injuries," it said.

"Leigh Day and Co, in the light of the expert evidence, now acknowledge that the slops could at worst have caused a range of short-term, low-level flu like symptoms and anxiety."

Neither the claimants nor Leigh Day and Co have independently commented on the settlement, which would amount to a $1,700 payout for each claimant.

Petroleum residues

In August 2006, Probo Koala, a ship chartered by Trafigura, dumped caustic soda and petroleum residues on city waste tips in Abidjan after first having attempted to offload the cargo in Amsterdam.

Transfigura has repeatedly denied any connection between the victims' problems and the waste.

Eric de Turckheim, the company director, said on Sunday that the settlement, which was signed the previous evening, "completely vindicates Trafigura".

"Over the past three years, the company has been the target of numerous attacks which have wrongly asserted that Trafigura's actions led to deaths and serious injuries," he said.

"These accusations have now been found to be baseless."

However, Transfigura did acknowledge that "the slops had a deeply unpleasant smell and their illegal dumping ... caused distress to the local population".

Other cases

Caustic soda and petroleum residues were dumped at sites around Abidjan [File: EPA]

Mark Taylor, an Oslo-based international law expert, said that the outcome was expected, despite coming just weeks before the dispute was due to go to court in London on October 6.

"It is a settlement that was probably in the making for some time," he said from Oslo, the Norwegian capital.

"It is quite common in these kinds of lawsuits for there to be negotiations before the court case and for the plaintiffs, in this case the people in Cote d'Ivoire, to agree with the defendants ... that will agree to drop the charges in exchange for compensation.

"With these kinds of settlements the plaintiffs, the people from Cote d'Ivoire and their lawyers based in London, are very often required to say nothing on the terms of the agreement.

"It may be that this is the last we hear about this case."

However, Taylor said that there were other cases proceeding in other jurisdictions, both in The Netherlands, where Tranfigura has a presence, and in Norway, where a similar case but not involving Probo Koala is planned.

"It remains unclear what role the people of the Cote d'Ivorie, the 31,000 plaintiffs in this case, will have in those other cases," he said.

Trafigura had previously agreed to a $198m out-of-court settlement with the Cote d'Ivoire government in 2007, which exempted it from legal proceedings in the West African country.

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