NEWS: Chinese Toxic Benzene Spill Reaches Russian River, page 1

Water polluted with highly toxic benzene has reached Russia's Amur River following an explosion at a petrochemical factory on China's Songhua river last month. Authorities are saying that the toxic waste which has now hit the Russian Amur river is not as concentrated as first expected and has diluted although environmentalist experts are warning that when the ice and snow currently blocking the waterway melts in Spring then Russia will see the full catastrophic results of the spill. Russia is calling on China for compensation over the spill.

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However, initial tests by Russian experts showed the slick, which contains benzene and nitrobenzene, is not as highly concentrated as had been feared and is continuing to dilute, officials from the emergency situations ministry said.

Chinese media also reported that the slick had significantly diluted ahead of entering the Amur, which forms part of the Russian-Chinese border and is known as the Heilong in China.

It is feared that Russia faces an environmental time bomb as poisonous substances trapped in ice are freed up and begin to spread. "Already now we must start preparing for the spring floods and the long-term effects of the accident," Mr Shoigu said.

China's state-run Xinhua news agency reported overnight that workers had begun building a temporary diversion dam on the Fuyuan waterway, which joins the Heilong and Wusuli rivers along the common border near Khabarovsk.

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Although the Chinese have said that the spill has diluted the problem is where has the rest of the toxic substance gone. It hasn't just disappeared and the warning of the ice melts in Spring could well forbode badly for the areas surrounding the waterways the toxic spill is travelling along.

The whole ecology system has been damaged by this spill and the full effects and fatalities of this spill may not be certain for many years to come. The incidences of cancers and childhood illnesses may rise sharply in these areas over the next ten to twenty years as the damage spreads far and wide through the eco system.

[edit on 16-12-2005 by Mayet]