Ecological scandal in Romania

Romanian authorities carry out investigations into ecological irregularities.

Roxana Vasile, 04.03.2020, 13:50

94% of European Union citizens and
87% of Romania’s citizens believe environmental protection is important,
according to an opinion poll conducted last December. The problems Romanians
are most concerned about are air pollution, the pollution of rivers, lakes and
underground water sources, pollution resulting from farming activities, soil
degradation, as well as the growing amount of waste.

Paradoxically, although Romania is a
country suffocated by waste, it is also an importer of waste. A BBC crew even came
to Romania last autumn to look for an explanation. They found out, for example,
that Romanian recycling firms handling the reprocessing of local waste risk
being deprived of their raw material in the absence of selective waste. This is
why they import waste from countries like the UK. The conclusion of the BBC
report was that the national legislation should regulate the recycling activity
and bring it in line with the EU standards, but things don’t seem to be going
well.

On Tuesday, the Bucharest
prosecutors charged three persons and a company for disposing of hundreds of
tonnes of waste by throwing it into the river Arges or burying it under gravel
pits in Ilfov and Giurgiu counties, close to Bucharest, thus causing
significant damage to the environment. The police have also conducted searches
in Bucharest, Ilfov and Giurgiu as part of a criminal investigation involving
two companies and several individuals suspected of collecting, shipping,
disposing of and burying waste in unauthorised places. In another case, 16
containers of toxic waste coming from the UK and described in official
documents as second-hand home appliances were discovered in the Black Sea port
of Constanta Sud Agigea. It is suspected that the waste in question was
supposed to be burnt illegally in Ilfov county or end up in one of the dumpsites
around Bucharest. The containers in question were returned to the sender and an
investigation has begun in connection with the illegal export and import of
waste and the use of untruthful documents at the customs. The prosecutor
working on the case says some 50 other containers full of waste may have
arrived in Romania when the UK was still a member of the European Union.

One of the palpable consequences of
such irregularities, which have gone on undetected so far, is the huge scandal
that broke out in Bucharest on Sunday night when air pollution measurements
showed ten times the admitted levels. The acting environment minister Costel
Alexe says the cause is the uncontrolled burning of waste in Bucharest and in
Ilfov county. (CM)