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Chirac hits at 'gangsters of sea'
PARIS, France (CNN) -- President Jacques Chirac has blamed the "gangsters of the sea" for the millions of oil pellets that are beginning to float onto France's beaches. Chirac has dispatched Prime Minister Jean-Pierre Raffarin and Ecology Minister Roselyne Bachelot to the coastal sites in southwestern France where black sludge has appeared. Early tests show the oil is from the Prestige tanker that sank about 100 miles off the northwestern coast of Spain in November. "This was not inevitable, it was the result of human actions," Chirac was reported by Reuters as saying. "France and Europe must not leave these shady men, these gangsters of the sea, to profit cynically from the lack of transparency in the current system." Blobs of oil have washed up on Atlantic beaches in the Landes region near Bordeaux, southwest France. Strong winds are pushing more of the oil towards La Rochelle. Christain Fremont, prefect of the southwestern Aquitaine region in southern France, said: "An oil slick that drifted to La Rochelle is being broken into millions of small pellets by winds and currents. "If these winds continue to blow this pollution will arrive on a vast scale very soon, perhaps even this weekend." French prosecutors have already opened a judicial inquiry into the causes of the Prestige spill. (Full story)
The Prestige went down after splitting in two in rough weather, taking with it much of its 77,000-tonne cargo of fuel oil. Chirac has been quick to put anti-pollution measures in place following criticism of Spanish Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar at the time of the sinking. France has sent a mini-submarine to the site of the sunken vessel in an attempt to plug the leaking holes. Chirac has tried to hasten moves by the European Commission to introduce measures to punish those responsible for shipping disasters. France still remembers the $860 million damage inflicted by the Erika spill in 1999. France has campaigned to pursue ship owners and crew who register their vessels under so-called flags of convenience in an attempt to sidestep maritime rules. "Flags of convenience" refers to ships registered in countries with lax safety, labour or tax rules.
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