Incident at Jilin

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On November 13, 2005, an explosion at a state-owned chemical plant in northeastern China’s Jilin province released 100 tons of benzene and other pollutants into the region’s Songhua River, killing five people and injuring 60 others. Within two weeks, the 80-kilometer-long toxic slick had flowed 370 kilometers north to Harbin, China’s eighth largest city (population 3.8 million). As the tainted waters passed, residents endured four days without public water, and shortages caused widespread panic. Other downstream locales, including Khabarovsk, the largest city in Russia’s Far East, witnessed similar scares, though most retained their water supplies.

Apart from the economic, ecological, and social consequences of the disaster, and unlike most industrial incidents in China, the Jilin disaster yielded major political fallout. Initially, factory and local government officials denied that the blast released any pollution and continued to repeat such statements for more than a week. As the slick approached Harbin, city officials informed residents they were…