Israelis deny their waste is reaching Cyprus shores

By Jean Christou

ISRAEL YESTERDAY denied dumping chemical waste off the coast of Cyprus, saying the substances being tipped into the Mediterranean were 300 kilometres away from the island.

In an official response to allegations by the environmental group Greenpeace, the Israeli embassy in Nicosia said all international environmental obligations had been adhered to.

The embassy was referring to permits given to the Israeli Electricity Company (IEC) to dispose of coal ash in the Mediterranean, and to the disposal of Haifa Chemicals’ treated remains of potash rock.

Greenpeace’s Mediterranean director Mario Damato said last week the dumping was taking place three times a week off the coast of Cyprus.

He added that the waste contained heavy metals and other highly dangerous pollutants and posed a serious threat to marine life.

But an Israeli embassy spokesman said yesterday there was “no way” the waste was reaching Cyprus’ shores.

The embassy announcement said the IEC had recently been given a special permit allowing it to dispose of 15,000 tons of coal ash in the Mediterranean for a limited period of six months.

The permit was granted, it said, on the condition the IEC present an acceptable land-based alternative within three months of issuing the permit.

The Israel Ministry of Environment has also instructed the IEC to reduce the amount of coal ash it produces in the meantime.

The permits granted to Haifa Chemicals allows the company to discharge 60, 000 tons of treated remains of potash rock into the sea, 40 kilometres off the shores of Israel at a depth of 1,500 metres until the end of 1998.

“The Israeli Ministry of the Environment… will continue to monitor the situation to ensure the protection of the marine environment,” the statement said.

“To date, there was no indication of damage to fish and marine plantation.”

The Cyprus Fisheries Department also said this week there was no indication that the waters around Cyprus had been polluted.

A Fisheries Department official said that systematic checks on the quality of the sea water around Cyprus had revealed no problems.

He said the direction of the currents around Cyprus made contamination of the sea around the island “impossible”.

The Cyprus Mail is the only English-language daily newspaper published in Cyprus. It was established in 1945 and today, with its popular and widely-read website, the Cyprus Mail is among the most trusted news sites in Cyprus. The newspaper is not affiliated with any political parties and has always striven to maintain its independence. Over the past 70-plus years, the Cyprus Mail, with a small dedicated team, has covered momentous events in Cyprus’ modern history, chronicling the last gasps of British colonial rule, Cyprus’ truncated independence, the coup and Turkish invasion, and the decades of negotiations to stitch the divided island back together, plus a myriad of scandals, murders, and human interests stories that capture the island and its -people. Observers describe it as politically conservative.