BEIJING, June 6 (RIA Novosti) - Three people have died following a spillage from a chemical facility in northeast China, near the Russian border, the country's official Xinhua news agency reported.
Local authorities have not yet given details on the facility, the cause of the spill, or the type of chemicals that have leaked into the surrounding area, located in the Heilongjiang province.
The reports have provoked fears in the province of a new major environmental disaster.
A November 2005 explosion at a plant owned by the Jilin Petroleum and Chemical Company caused 100 metric tons of potentially lethal benzene to spill into the Songhua River.
The spillage caused substantial environmental damage in Russia's Far East, as a huge slick of chemicals was carried along the Amur River, eventually spilling into the Sea of Okhotsk. China delayed informing Russia of the incident for several days.
