NEWS

EYDAP denies Asopos cover-up

The Athens Water Supply and Sewerage Company (EYDAP) yesterday denied charges by a left-wing Euro MP that clean water was dumped into the polluted Asopos River in central Greece ahead of inspections in order to dilute toxic chemicals in the water and «make the river appear clean.» EYDAP reportedly admitted that a total of 15,000 cubic meters of water from the Yliki Reservoir was transferred to the Asopos ahead of a visit by a parliamentary committee to the river in the middle of last month. But the company claimed that the bulk of this water was moved after the reservoir reached the point of overflow due to a short circuit at the pumping station. Another 5,000 cubic meters of water dumped in the Asopos had been used to wash out the pipes of the Mornos-Marathonas aqueduct, EYDAP has claimed. But, according to Dimitris Papadimoulis, a Euro MP from the Coalition for the Radical Left (SYRIZA), some 400,000 cubic meters of water was dumped in the Asopos, which successive tests have shown to contain high traces of the toxic chemical hexavalent chromium. Papadimoulis told Skai that the water was transferred to the Asopos in order to «make it appear clean.» Meanwhile, it emerged that Brussels is preparing legal action against Greece due to its failure to meet EU standards on water management. Responding to a question tabled in the European Parliament by Communist Party MP Thanassis Pafilis, the European Commission said it would «continue to assess all available information and take all necessary measures, including, if necessary, procedures against violation… of the acquis communautaire.» Last month Euro MPs called on Greece to move quickly to clean up the Asopos River, claiming that the presence in local water of high levels of hexavalent chromium was a «European problem.»

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