Stephanie Roth of the Romanian action group, Alburnus Major, comments (on 16th September):
Published by MAC on 2004-09-15Stephanie Roth of the Romanian action group, Alburnus Major, comments (on 16th September):
"Regarding the tailing pond accident in the catchment area of the Aries river that occurrd on 14th September 2004. Cuprumin Abrud Ltd's Rosia Poieni facility released tailing and the copper level is 80 times and iron is 28 times the allowed concentration.
Stefania Simion from Alburnus Maior called the regional environment inspectorate in Alba Iulia, who replied that this is not their responsibility. So Stefania called the Regional Enirvonmental Guard who said that there is nothing to worry about and 'all is under control';) she was referred to the Romanian Water Authority Apele Romane' in Turda who said that they will call us tomorrow...
Guarda de Mediu however, confirmed that no sanctions were made against Cuprumin; this because the accident was not due to human error but to mother nature attacking the Apuseni Mountains with naughty and heavy rainfalls - heard that one before? So did we, back in 2000 in a place called Baia Mare...and we are likely to hear it again with politicians pointing out that the'privatization' of these state owned crumbling mining operations will of course resolve all these problems."