The State Council set up a new investigation team on Tuesday to
establish the chain of events involved in the recent chemical plant
explosion and ensuing river pollution in the northeastern provinces
of Jilin and Heilongjiang and to determine who should be held
accountable.
It will include an investigation into how the benzene was
discharged into the Songhua River without proper treatment.
The State Council had previously dispatched a work team to
Harbin, where the water supply was shut off for five days due to
the contamination, and Premier Wen
Jiabao visited the city as well.
Li Yizhong, director of the State Administration for Work
Safety, was appointed head of the team and the Supreme People's
Procuratorate will participate in it.
Seven vice minister-level officials from the Ministry of
Supervision, Commission for Supervision and Management of
State-owned Properties, All-China Federation of Trade Unions, State
Environmental Protection Administration and provincial governments
of Jilin and Heilongjiang were appointed deputy heads.
Foreign Ministry spokesperson Qin Gang told a regular news
conference yesterday that Wen wrote to Russian Prime Minister
Mikhail Fradkov on Sunday about the river pollution that is
expected to also affect areas of Russia, pledging to further
enhance cooperation to reduce damage from pollution spills.
According to Heilongjiang provincial information center, the
State Development Bank of China has approved a 150 million yuan
(US$19 million) emergency loan to help Harbin deal with water
pollution, with another 490 million yuan (US$61 million) short-term
loan expected in a week.
The blast at a chemical plant in Jilin, owned by a subsidiary of
China National Petroleum Corporation, on November 13 released large
amounts of benzene and nitrobenzene into the Songhua River that has
since threatened many settlements' water supplies as it proceeds
downstream.
(Xinhua News Agency December 7, 2005)
