ABIDJAN/AMSTERDAM (Reuters) – International  commodities trader Trafigura said yesterday it had reached a  settlement with thousands of people in Ivory Coast who said they  had fallen ill from toxic waste dumped around the economic  capital Abidjan.

Each of the 31,000 claimants represented by British law firm  Leigh Day and Co would be entitled to damages of about 950  pounds ($1,553), Trafigura board director Eric de Turckheim told  Reuters.

Trafigura said the settlement was in no way an admission of  liability. An Ivorian group representing the victims said it  rejected the offer, and accused the company of exploiting  Africa’s poverty to end the row and avoid taking responsibility.

Trafigura, one of the world’s biggest commodities traders  with offices in Geneva, Amsterdam and London, has repeatedly  denied any wrongdoing in relation to the 2006 incident, when  slops from a cargo ship it had chartered were dumped in Abidjan,  the main city in Ivory Coast.