WARSAW — Poison is ruled out as a cause of mass fish mortality in the Oder, but tests so far have not shown that poisonous ingredients are to blame, Poland’s Environment Minister Anna Moskwa said Sunday.
Tons of dead fish have been discovered since last July in the Oder River, which passes through Germany and Poland. Both countries said they were to blame for a poisonous substance, but they still didn’t know what it was.
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“To date, none of those tests (of the water) have shown the presence of poisonous substances,” Moskwa said after meeting with his German counterpart and other German and Polish officials.
“At the same time, we are conducting tests on fish. We have tested fish for mercury and heavy metals. Neither mercury nor heavy metals were in the samples collected,” he added.
Moskwa said samples are being tested lately for the presence of insecticides and another three hundred ingredients will be reviewed in the coming hours.
“We have not yet ruled out a variant of poisonous substances . . . we are interested in the immediate identity of the author. . . We determine entities that manage advertising and advertising activities along the river,” Moskwa added.
The governments of Germany and Poland have said mass mortality is a primary environmental crisis and that the waterway may take years to return to normal. (Report by Anna Koper, written by Jan Lopatka and Anna Koper, edited by Alexander Smith and Hugh Lawson)
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