MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

King's envoy visits all the K's men

In his first meetings with government officials since arriving in Argentina on Wednesday, Spaniard Juan Antonio Yáñez-Barnuevo was handed documents that Buenos Aires considers essential in its argument against the construction of a paper pulp mill on the Uruguayan side of the Uruguay River.

The papers were given to him in meetings with Cabinet Chief Alberto Fernández, Foreign Minister Jorge Taiana and senior Foreign Ministry officials, while the meeting with Kirchner was mere protocol.

Fernández said that his meeting with Yáñez-Barnuevo, in which Taiana also took part, had been positive and said he was hopeful that Spain's mediation would end the diplomatic rift.

Argentina has claimed that the mill being constructed in Uruguay by the Finnish firm Botnia will pollute the river but is currently focusing its diplomatic argument against Montevideo on the fact that Uruguay allegedly breached a binational treaty, signed in 1975, when it authorized the installation of the plant without Argentine consent.

Once Yáñez-Barnuevo, who is also the Spanish ambassador to the UN, gathers information from both Buenos Aires and Montevideo, where he will be travelling from here, it will be analyzed by Spanish officials. Sources confirmed that Yáñez-Barnuevo, who so far has avoided contacts with the press, believes the conflict will only be solved when both countries act willingly.

On Wednesday the World Bank postponed a meeting until Tuesday to consider if it will grant a loan to Botnia to finance the mill. Buenos Aires has celebrated the decision as the consequence of Argentine lobbying spearheaded since last week by Romina Picolotti, the environment secretary, who travelled to Washington to meet with a number of senior officials of the organization.

Picolotti was also joined later on by a group of environmentalists from the Argentine city of Gualeguaychú, where the fight against the mill is centered. The environmentalists also met with World Bank officials.

One of the activists said that the meeting held yesterday with the International Finance Corporation (IFC), the private-sector branch of the World Bank, had been tough. He also declared that he was not sure it had amounted to anything.

According to Oscar Bargas, the IFC should not finance the construction of the pulp plant until the case is settled in the World Court in The Hague, which is considering an Argentine claim against the plant.

Bargas explained that throughout the meeting, World Bank executives had seemed willing to encourage tourism both in Fray Bentos ? the area where the mill will be installed ? and Gualeguaychú and promised to visit the area to show the pulp project would not stop tourism. This, Bargas considered, was completely absurd. Buenos Aires Herald