Macedonians Protest Against 'Killer' Smelter

Photo by: Save Veles Info

Under the slogan “No more smelter!” thousands of people from Veles, including the mayor, urged the government not to allow the Metrudhem company to restart the zinc and lead smelter in their town, which has lain idle for eight years.

"We are waging this battle for a clean environment in the name of future generations,” mayor Goran Petrov said. “We must win this battle and not allow any more pollution in our town”.

Support for the protest, timed to coincide with the day of Veles’s liberation at the end of the Second World War, came from the local association of doctors, from pensioners groups, World War 2 veterans, clergy and local businessmen.

The rally started at the central Sarmaale square and ended in front of the gates of the factory.

Comparing it to a serial killer, protesters said the smelter had killed and wrecked the health of countless people in the past.
 
The factory, built in the 1970s and owned by the Yugoslav state, was idled after independence in 2004 after generating large financial losses.

In April 2009 Metrudhem paid €2.25 million to become the new owner of the former industrial giant, which once employed some 1,500 workers.

Residents became alarmed after the company recently announced that it planned to reopen the smelter.
 
Metrudhem spokesperson Aleksandar Bilbilov on Monday tried to calm tempers, saying the company would meet all ecological standards before reopening the smelter. He said the factory would also employ more than 1,000 workers.

“Fear has been created by the new plans - but that fear has its origin in the old factory,” Bilbilov said on Monday.

But in a letter of intention that Metrudhem sent to the Ministry of Enviroment in August, the company admitted that the factory's emissions would pollute the air, soil and water in the surroundings.

“The process includes sintering, which is the biggest source of emissions of zinc, led, cadmium and sulfur dioxide,” the letter said. The company admitted that these elements are “significant pollutants”.

In addition, the company said the factory would produce about 600 square meters of polluted waste water per day.

In 2005, a study by the European Agency for Reconstruction found that the soil, water and air in Veles had been significantly polluted by emissions from the factory. Quantities of toxic metals were found in the environment.

Earlier, in 2001, the World Health Organization, WHO, described the town of some 46,000 residents as an environmental black spot, listing it among the most critically polluted places in the world.

Local doctors believe that high levels of pollution have been responsible for high rates of cancer and other diseases as well as many abnormalities among newborn children in Veles.