(Itar-Tass) -A new chemical pollution of the Songhua river, also known as the Sungari, a tributary of the Amur, has occurred in China.
The newspaper South China Morning Post said on Thursday that a chemical factory located not far from the city of Jilin illegally dumped into the Mannu, one of tributaries of the Sungari, a great amount of production waste containing benzol derivatives, including the toxic substance aniline, reports Trend.
The Chinese side asserts that the situation has been taken under control.
It has reported that the toxic slick had been stopped in an area 14 kilometres from the confluence of the Mannu with the Sungari.
The urgent construction of a dam has been begun for that and activated charcoal used as an absorbent for water cleaning.
Despite these measures, the quality of the water of the Mannu, which flows through Jilin, a city of two million, remains bad.
After the leakage of chemicals, authorities issued a circular order banning the use of the drinking water from the contaminated river.
Police have detained several workers of the factory who were involved in the incident.
A series of similar incidents have happened on Chinas rivers over the past months.
An explosion at a chemical plant resulted in a major environmental accident in last years November, with about 100 tonnes of nitrobenzol and its derivatives, getting in the Sungari.
The Russian Agency for Surveillance of Natural Resources has begun monitoring the situation with the repeat pollution of the Sungari, the Ministry of Natural Resources said in a statement faxed to ITAR-TASS.
It will send in the nearest time an inquiry to China demanding full information about circumstances of the pollution and the state of the water in the river, the ministry said.