* Senior judges say appeal has "real prospect of success"
* Claimants' lawyers hail ruling as "monumental judgment"
* BHP says proceedings do not belong in UK
* 2015 dam failure caused Brazil's worst environmental
disaster
(Adds lawyer quote)
By Kirstin Ridley
LONDON, July 27 (Reuters) - London's Court of Appeal made a
U-turn on Tuesday by agreeing to reopen a $7 billion lawsuit by
200,000 claimants against Anglo-Australian mining giant BHP
, reviving a case over a dam rupture behind
Brazil's worst environmental disaster.
Lawyers for one of the largest group claims in English legal
history have been pushing to resurrect the 5 billion pound ($6.9
billion) lawsuit against BHP since a lower court struck out the
lawsuit as an abuse of process last year - and a Court of Appeal
judge upheld that decision in March.
But in a highly unusual move, three Appeal Court judges on
Tuesday reversed course and granted permission for appeal,
saying they believed it had a "real prospect of success".
The collapse in 2015 of the Fundao dam, owned by the Samarco
venture between BHP and Brazilian iron ore mining giant Vale
, killed 19 and obliterated villages as a torrent of
more than 40 million cubic metres of mining waste swept into the
Doce river and Atlantic Ocean over 650 km (400 miles) away.
Tom Goodhead, a PGMBM managing partner who is bringing the
claim on behalf of Brazilian individuals, businesses, churches,
organisations, municipalities and indigenous people, called it a
"monumental judgement".
Frederico de Assis Faria, Attorney General of Brazil's
hard-hit district of Mariana, said victims now had "an
opportunity for real justice" six years after the disaster.
BHP, the world's largest mining company by market value, has
labelled the case pointless and wasteful, saying it duplicates
proceedings in Brazil and the work of the Renova Foundation, an
entity created by the company and its Brazilian partners to
manage reparations and repairs.
"BHP's position remains that the proceedings do not belong
in the UK," it said in a statement.
'GOOD DAY FOR JUSTICE'
The case was revived after PGMBM in April applied for an
oral Court of Appeal hearing - reserved only for exceptional
cases - and argued the appeal judge had not properly grappled
with arguments about why the case should proceed.
Martyn Day, the Leigh Day lawyer who has taken on miner
Vedanta and oil giant Shell in English courts on behalf
of villagers over alleged pollution in Zambia and oil spills in
the Niger delta respectively, welcomed the ruling.
"It is highly unusual for the Court of Appeal to use this
mechanism (of an oral hearing) for reviewing a decision of a
fellow member of the court," he said. "A good day for justice."
Claimant lawyers have argued that most of their clients have
not brought proceedings in Brazil, that they are entitled to sue
BHP in England and that Brazilian litigation is so lengthy that
it cannot provide full redress in a realistic timeframe.
The lawsuit is the latest battle to establish whether
multinationals can be held liable for the conduct of overseas
subsidiaries on their home turf.
The appeal is expected to be heard next year and any ruling
is likely to be further appealed to the Supreme Court in London.
(Reporting by Kirstin Ridley; Editing by Kirsten Donovan and
Edmund Blair)
