Jun 21, 2000 - 03:54
PM
Thousands of Seals
Die in Caspian Sea Workers have collected and destroyed the bodies
of 11,000 seals, said Galina Yeroshenkova of Kazakstan's Emergency Situations
Agency. She said Wednesday that the deaths have come to an end.
Bekbulat Yeleushev, a department head in
Kazakstan's Environmental Ministry, said, "The disease developed as a
result of a very warm winter, for which the seals were not ready."
But Makhambet Khakimov, head of the
non-governmental group Caspian Nature, said deaths are continuing. Researchers
from his organization were finding more dead seals, as well as sturgeon, along
the shore, Khakimov said.
He said the Astrakhan Fishing Institute has
concluded the seals were killed by an infectious disease that hit the animals
after their immune systems were weakened by oil-related pollutants in the sea.
AP-ES-06-21-00 1552EDT
ALMATY, Kazakstan
(AP) - Thousands of seals have been found dead along Kazakstan's Caspian Sea
coast - deaths officials blame on unusually warm weather but environmental
experts say are linked to oil pollution.
