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Oil slick bound for Turkey |
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Written by The Sunday Times
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Sunday, 06 August 2006 06:22 |
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Holiday beaches in Turkey are at risk from an oil slick that is being described by Greenpeace as the “worst environmental disaster ever experienced in the Mediterranean”.
As much as 35,000 tonnes of oil has spilt into the sea after the Israelis bombed a Beirut power station on July 15. The Lebanese environment minister, Yacoub al-Sarraf, says the pollution will have “terrible consequences, not only for our own country but for all the countries of the eastern Mediterranean”.
How much more oil may yet leak into the sea from the power station is unknown. Tanks above ground are still burning, and tens of thousands of tonnes remain in fractured underground reservoirs just yards from the sea.
The Lebanese beaches, which are breeding grounds for green turtles, are now covered in a deadly black sludge, and the Israeli blockade has prevented clean-up crews from containing the spill.
Fouad Hamdan, director of Friends of the Earth Europe, told The Sunday Times that the slick was now heading for the beaches of southern Turkey: “Satellite photos show that the spill has already crept halfway up the Syrian coast, and could wash up on Turkish beaches as early as next week. When it will hit Cyprus is all a matter of wind.”
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