Brussels, 08/09/2000 (Agence Europe) - The international Task Force "Baia Mare", given the task of assessing the damage caused by cyanide pollution throughout the Danube region after the Baia Mare accident (Romania), and of determining action to be undertaken to decontaminate the environment and prevent all similar risks, has published an inventory of high risk sites in the mining, extractive and ore-processing industries in the Tizsa river basin (Danube tributary).
Limited to the four countries concerned - Romania, Hungary, Slovakia and Ukraine - in accordance with the mandate entrusted to the Task Force, the inventory lists 40 high risk sites which use dams and dykes for the storage of mining waste or sludge likely to contain heavy metals and other toxic substances, or which could cause leaks or collapse as they are ill-designed to fulfil this function or badly maintained. The Romanian, Slovakian and Hungarian environment ministers assured the Task Force that they would take immediate measures to remedy this situation.
In announcing this news, the spokesperson for Margot Wallström, Environment Commissioner, stressed the Commission's satisfaction at being able to have the results of this study available. She began the examination with a view to determining to what extent the Community legislation should be completed or amended to face up to risks of this kind, risks from which the European Union is not exempt. The Task Force, chaired by Tom Garvey, is to meet on 2 October to discuss with Commission services on the appropriate legislative proposals that could be envisaged to cover similar sites in the Union (such as the inclusion of mining waste within the scope of the directive on dangerous waste and the inclusion of mining activities under the scope of the Seveso directive on prevention of serious industrial accidents, for example).
EUROPE recalls that the report on the storage of toxic waste in Union countries, published in April 1999 by the WWF (World Wide Fund for Nature) identified similar cases of pollution in several Member States (Sweden, Spain, Italy, Portugal and United Kingdom) and the potential risks of pollution linked to uncertainty about the method of eliminating waste (in Finland, Greece, Austria and France), as well as the almost total lack of public information on where the storage sites of toxic waste are located and on the risks for human health and the environment.