WARSAW, Poland – Germany’s environment minister said the mass die-off of fish in the Oder River is an ecological disaster and it’s not yet clear how long the river will take to recover.
Steffi Lemke spoke at a press conference along with her Polish counterpart Anna Moskwa on Sunday after a meeting in Szczecin, a Polish city on the Oder River.
The Oder runs from the Czech Republic to the border between Poland and Germany before emptying into the Baltic Sea. Ten tons of dead fish were removed from it last week, but Mokswa said the cause of the mass die-off has not yet been determined.
“So far, at least 150 water samples from the Oder have been analyzed. None of the studies have confirmed the presence of toxic substances. At the same time we test fish. No mercury or other heavy metals were found in them,” she said.
She said some water samples from the Oder were sent to foreign laboratories to be tested for about 300 substances.
Both ministers said their focus now is on doing everything possible to limit damage to the river’s ecosystem.
Lemke suggested German authorities were not alerted quickly enough after dead fish were discovered in Poland and said communication between the two countries should be improved.