ARMENIAN POLICE INVESTIGATE DAMAGE TO TOXIC WASTE SITE
Hasmik Smbatian
ticle/2044899.html
17.05.2010
Armenia — Journalist EdiK Baghdasaryan investigates the chemical
waste disposal site in Nubarashen, Yerevan, undated
The Armenian police said on Monday that they have formally launched
criminal proceedings into the mysterious digging up of an industrial
grave near Yerevan that dangerously exposed large amounts of toxic
waste.
The Soviet-era burial site located near the city’s southern Nubarashen
suburb contains more than 500 metric tons of DDT and other poisonous
substances that had been used by Armenian chemical enterprises.
An Armenian journalist and several environmentalists discovered
late last month that unknown individuals had broken into the site,
tearing down its fencing and flattening a mound of land covering the
waste with bulldozers or other heavy machinery.
Responding to their dire warnings, the Armenian government has
scrambled to restore the site with 31.6 million drams ($82,000) in
emergency funding approved on May 7. The government has been widely
criticized for its slow response to what ecologists regards as a
potential environment disaster.
A national police spokesman told RFE/RL’s Armenian service that a
criminal case has been opened under two articles of the Criminal Code
dealing with substantial damage to property and violations of safety
standards that put many lives at risk. Nobody has been questioned or
detained as part of the inquiry yet, he said.
Meanwhile, senior officials from the Armenian ministries of environment
protection and emergencies assured journalists that relevant
authorities have already put warning signs around the burial site
and are now busy covering it with new thick layers of soil and clay,
restoring its water drainage system and circling it with barbed wire.
They said the urgent measures are only the first phase of a waste
disposal program envisaged by the government. They said its ultimate
objective is the destruction of the dangerous chemicals.
"We have no destruction facilities in Armenia," said Hovannes Yemishian
of the Emergencies Ministry. "Transporting it to another country is
also problematic." The transportation process alone could cost $2.5
million, he told a news conference.
"We could appeal to the Russian Federation which has many such
facilities and can destroy such substances very well, and it would
cost us less," said Anahit Aleksandrian, the head of an Environment
Ministry department dealing with toxic waste disposal. "Our main
problem is transportation," she added, alluding to the fact that
Armenia has no common border with Russia.
Prime Minister Tigran Sarkisian likewise said on May 7 that the
destruction process will be costly and require funding from Armenia’s
foreign donors.