SIBERIAN rivers have turned into poisonous streams carrying large amounts of
toxic chemicals into the Arctic Ocean,
harming wildlife in the region.
According to the findings of State of the
Arctic Environment, a report compiled
by scientists from eight Arctic nations
and published recently in Norway, these
rivers contain hundred times more
polychlorinated biphenyls (PCBS) and
pesticides like dichloro-diphenyltrichloroethane (DDT) and lindane than
North American and Scandinavian rivers.
The most polluted rivers are the Ob,
Yenisei and Pechora, says Derek Muir of
the Canadian government's Freshwater
Institute in Winnipeg. Russia had
stopped manufacturing DDT in the
1980s but it still has old stocks which are
widely used in Siberia to fight plagues of
insects, says Stanislav Belikov of the All Russia Research Institute for Nature
Conservation in Moscow. The Ob and
Yenisei rivers flush out as much as 50
tonnes Of DDT in a year. High levels of
PCBS were found in ringed seals in Kara
Sea and they are also suspected in walruses, porpoises, whales, gulls, sea
eagles, foxes and polar bears.
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