Balti, Moldova — Thousands of Moldovans have been left without water after oil polluted a major river that flows through both countries as a result of a Russian attack on a hydroelectric power plant in neighboring Ukraine.
Moldovan President Maia Sandu has blamed Russia for pollution on the Dniester River following an attack on Ukraine’s Novodnistrovsk hydropower plant on March 7, saying it is “endangering Moldova’s water supply” in the EU candidate country.
The Ukrainian plant is located about 15 kilometers (9 mi) upstream from Moldova’s northern border with Ukraine and supplies water to about 80% of Moldova’s population of approximately 2.5 million. Moscow has repeatedly targeted Ukraine’s civilian infrastructure, such as dams and river ports, since launching an all-out invasion of the country in 2022.
“Russia takes full responsibility,” Sandu said in a post on X on Sunday.
Moldova’s environment ministry on Sunday declared a 15-day environmental alert, giving authorities a legal mechanism to boost technical intervention and impose temporary restrictions on water supplies.
“We are taking this decision to ensure that we can prevent any risk to the health of the population,” it said. “Due to the continuing wave of pollution with oil products, the risk of pollution spreading, and exceeding pollutant levels in the northern area of the Dniester River.”
Although oil pollutants have been confirmed in the river following the strike, the exact source of the pollutant is not yet clear.
The situation has forced authorities to cut water supplies to several districts, including Moldova’s second-largest city, Balti, which has a population of about 90,000. Along with humanitarian aid from neighboring Romania, Moldova’s military this week moved in with a 10-ton tanker to distribute drinking water to the northern city.
“It’s very hard, very hard,” said Balti resident Liuba Istrati, 84, carrying buckets of water up to her apartment. “We live on the fifth floor, it’s just the two of us, old people, my husband is sick in bed.”
Water shortage has also forced some schools to close and start online studies.
“It’s a complicated situation, I have to come every day to get water,” said Irina Matluk, a teacher who lives in Balti. “Even for one person you need a lot of water for bathrooms and so on, so it’s really complicated.”
Officials are now racing to clean up the pollution and analyze and monitor the river water. Neighboring Romania, which has close ties with Moldova, has sent teams to aid cleanup efforts and equipment such as absorbent materials for dams.
“The latest samples taken show improvements in water indicators, confirming the effectiveness of filters and barriers to capture and dispose of pollutants,” the environment ministry said on Wednesday.
The ministry said authorities are “working at an accelerated pace” to resume water supply, “but this decision will be made exclusively on the basis of at least two consecutive sets of analyzes conducted on two different days… Protecting the health of citizens remains the absolute priority.”
Moldova’s Environment Minister Gheorghe Hajdar said at a press briefing on Wednesday that for the first time since the crisis began, three key monitoring points on the river “reached acceptable limits” of oil pollution.
He said if analyzes show similar results or improve over the next 48 hours, authorities will consider reopening a pumping station on the northeastern border with Ukraine, which supplies several districts, and buckets.
He said, “This is clear evidence that upstream oil diversions have been substantially reduced, and that absorbing dams have had an impact.”
The Dniester River originates in southwestern Ukraine and extends for more than 1,300 kilometers (846 mi), flowing downstream through Moldova, passing through southern Ukraine and back into the Black Sea.
“Although values may temporarily return within acceptable limits at some points, the substances continue to arrive in waves, making it difficult to accurately predict growth,” the environment ministry said.
Moldova’s General Prosecutor’s Office said on Tuesday it would open a criminal case to investigate the matter, while Moldova’s Foreign Ministry summoned Russia’s ambassador to Chisinau, Oleg Ozerov, who was presented with a bottle of brown water.
In an online statement on Wednesday, the Russian Embassy in Moldova argued that Moldovan authorities have not presented any evidence of Russia’s complicity, except for “a container containing an unknown cloudy liquid, with no marks as to where and when it was obtained” and that “by definition this cannot be evidence of anything.”
The statement claimed that Moldovan officials put forward “conflicting theories” while “publicly claiming a lack of accurate information about the nature, type and amount of pollutants involved in the incident.”
Ilya Trombitsky, a biologist at Eco-TIRAS, an organization of NGOs in Moldova and Ukraine, says that although it is still difficult to determine the short-term or long-term consequences of pollution, the fact that “many cities are without water is a clear social damage.”
“It depends on the nature of the pollutant… We still don’t know the source or the substance of the pollution,” he told The Associated Press. “It’s clear that it’s not healthy for birds, wetland birds. It’s clear that some invertebrates are killed, especially upstream … crustaceans, but small, (which) can be fish food.”
“Moldova has not experienced such leaks,” he said.
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McGrath reported from Leamington Spa, England.
