[A-List] Destructive creation: oil spill recriminations

["Michael Keaney" <michael.keaney@xxxxxx>]

Wrecked 'Prestige' is still leaking oil, says Portugal
By Elizabeth Nash in Madrid
The Independent, 25 November 2002

Portugal said yesterday that the sunken tanker Prestige was still spewing
oil into the sea, despite denials from the Spanish government.

A director of the Portuguese navy's Hydrographic Institute, Captain Augusto
Ezequiel, said navy aircraft had sighted a slick about two miles long and
several hundred yards wide off the Galician coast. "There was leakage
detected at the site. It was still coming up where the ship sank," he said.

Antonio Martins da Cruz, Portugal's Foreign Minister, declined to comment on
Spain's assertion that there were no fresh leaks from the vessel, which sunk
about 135 miles west of Vigo, Europe's biggest fishing port. "I myself, the
Portuguese government, entirely trust the observations being made by the
navy's Hydrographic Institute," he said.

Amid mounting recriminations over who was responsible for the oil spill,
Spanish ministers responded with anger to criticism from SMIT, the salvage
company ordered to tow the Prestige out to sea.

Jaume Matas, the Environment Minister, said: "It's a disgrace that we should
have to provide explanations for these people. That's all we need. They are
the ones who provoked the spill. The government has done everything possible
to avert greater damage and to solve the problem."

But a spokesman for SMIT dismissed the allegation. "We wanted a place to
repair the vessel and Spain made us go out to sea with a ship that was
sinking and leaking oil. That was the worst of all possible solutions," he
said.

On Saturday, Francisco Alvarez Cascos, the Spanish Public Works Minister,
said the Greek captain of the Prestige was responsible for the tragedy,
having turned off the motors and allowed the stricken vessel to drift three
miles off shore. Loyola de Palacio, the EU's Transport commissioner, told
Spanish radio yesterday that tighter regulations governing the seaworthiness
of oil tankers encircling Europe would be brought forward from 2004 and
introduced next year.

Hundreds of volunteers from all over Spain converged on the blighted
coastline to help clean up but their efforts were hampered by a lack of
equipment. Galicia's Socialist Party said it would lodge a censure motion
against the region's veteran conservative president, Manuel Fraga, for going
on a hunting trip when the black tide engulfed the coast last weekend.

A break in the storms that have pounded the Galician coast for several days
allowed specialised ships to start removing oil. Strong winds have pushed
the slick north-east, closer to the Spanish coast. The newspaper La Voz de
Galicia said some of the oil might reach France and Britain.

Spain's Development Ministry said on Saturday that the risk of the slick
reaching Portugal was diminishing. Winds from the south-west have so far
kept the oil from Portugal's fishing grounds and coast, whose beaches are an
attraction for the 12 million tourists visiting each year.