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Russia to press China over spill amid toxic slick repeat fears

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KHABAROVSK, August 24 (RIA Novosti) - An environmental watchdog in Russia's Far East is set to ask China about a reported chemical spill into a river that could mirror a massive accident that hit the area late last year.

Chinese media said Wednesday that on August 20 the Jilin chemical plant discharged industrial waste containing highly toxic benzene into the Songhua River, a tributary of the Amur River, which passes through the Khabarovsk Territory in Russia. Local witnesses said a toxic slick, 5 kilometers (about 3.5 miles) long, was moving along the river.

And Viktor Bardyuk, the head of environmental protection agency in regional center Khabarovsk, said Russia would seek an answer from China because it had little reliable information.

"We plan to make an official inquiry with the Chinese Consulate in Khabarovsk on Thursday," the official said.

A blast at the plant belonging to the Jilin Petroleum and Chemical Company in the northeastern Chinese province of Heilongjiang on November 13, 2005, caused 100 metric tons of potentially lethal benzene to spill into the Songhua and came close to creating an environmental catastrophe in the Russian Far East as a massive slick passed along the Amur.

China failed to inform Russia until days after the incident.

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