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DAM-L Europe: Revival Planned for the Black Sea and Danube River (fwd)
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Date: Mon, 05 Nov 2001 10:40:53 -0600
Subject: Europe: Revival Planned for the Black Sea and Danube River
To: dianne@sandelman.ottawa.on.ca
Message-ID: <200111051044453.SM00440@mail.iatp.org>
Right to Water (right-to-water@iatp.org) Posted: 11/05/2001 By svarghese@iatp.org
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Revival Planned for the Black Sea and Danube River
BRUSSELS, Belgium, November 2, 2001 (ENS) - The European Union has
announced plans for reinforced international cooperation to clean up the
River Danube and the Black Sea. Under the initiative, countries of the
region will voluntarily implement the EU's new water framework directive
even though several of them are not yet even candidates to join the bloc.
Ministers will meet in Brussels on November 26 to formalize the agreement.
In a policy paper released this week, the European Commission said the
Danube Black Sea region is facing acute environmental problems. Key among
these are nitrate and phosphorus eutrophication and pollution by hazardous
substances.
The Danube is the source of drinking water for 10 million people in
Yugoslavia, Romania, Bulgaria, Moldova and Ukraine. Last year's toxic waste
spill of cyanide laced mine waste in Romania which killed much of the
aquatic life in the Danube River system emphasised the dire state of this,
the longest waterway in Europe.
Last month in Kalmar, Sweden, a regional team who are members of the Global
International Waters Assessment (GIWA) presented a report warning that the
Black Sea is in crisis as a result of chronic overfishing, high levels of
pollution and the devastating impacts of alien species.
Large discharges of raw sewage, damaging levels of coastal erosion and the
suffocating impacts of dumping of sludges and muds dredged from ports,
complicate the Black Sea's problems, the GIWA scientists said.
The centerpiece of the European response is a political commitment by all
Danubian countries, including those in the former Yugoslavia and Soviet
Union, to implement the water framework directive and its river basin
management principles over a 10 year period. This has been made recently
under the existing Danube river protection convention.
No extra European Union funding is proposed, but the Commission said
existing aid commitments will made be "more efficient" in targeting sources
of Danube pollution.
{Published in cooperation with ENDS Environment Daily, Europe's choice for
environmental news. Environmental Data Services Ltd, London. Email:
envdaily@ends.co.uk}
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