Latvia’s Love Canal

The World

Reporter Bruce Gellerman visits what Latvian environmental activists call their republic’s worst toxic waste dump. At the site just outside the capital Riga, liquid waste from five chemical and pharmaceutical factories is stored in open pools, burned in a crude incinerator and injected into the ground. The waste is suspected of killing a nearby forest and causing abnormally high rates of retardation, miscarriage and infant mortality.

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