Environmentalists from four East European countries Wednesday urged their governments to ban polluting effluents after a lake containing heavy metal waste spilt over in Romania following flash floods.
"Stop the pollution of our rivers with toxic mining waste," 45 environmental organisations said in a joint letter to the governments of Romania, Slovakia, Hungary and Ukraine.
The letter also underlined the "vulnerability of the mining industry in extreme climate conditions" such as the torrential rains experienced recently in Romania and Ukraine.