MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

One injured in protest against Botnia plant

The environmentalist demonstrators chained themselves to the ferry company fences

One person was injured yesterday amid scuffles between police and a group of demonstrators who attempted to block the port terminal of the Buquebus ferry company in the Buenos Aires city neighbourhood of Puerto Madero. The protest is against the Finnish Botnia pulp plant being built in Uruguay.

The environmentalist demonstrators chained themselves to the fences of Buquebus - a company that links Buenos Aires with Uruguay - and others struggled with police. One man suffered some beatings, and cuts in the head. Two people were arrested. Demonstrators in Gualeguaychú, Entre Ríos province, blocked route 14 to demand the release of the two arrested people. Environmentalists have intermittently blocked the three road crossings between the two countries to protest against the plant. Argentina claims that the pulp plant being built in Fray Bentos, on the River Uruguay, will contaminate the Argentine environment. Uruguay says that the plant meets the world's more demanding environmental standards. The case is in the hands of the World Court, which last year turned down an Argentine demand aimed at having the construction of the plant stopped, and an Uruguayan demand to force the Argentine government to remove road blocks. Meanwhile, the Uruguayan administration of President Tabaré Vázquez was concerned about threats launched by Argentine demonstrators, said Omar Lafluf, mayor of the Río Negro district where the plant is being built. "I called (Uruguayan) Foreign Minister Reinaldo Gargano to express my concern regarding the threats from the Gualeguaychú environmentalists, which are increasingly tougher. Gargano told me that was the same concern the (Uruguayan) government had," Lafluf told AP over the phone. Lafluf also said that yesterday the remains of a Chilean worker who died when an iron beam fell from a height of 18 metres and hit him on the head, was yesterday sent to Chile. The accident led Uruguay's construction workers' union to declare a general strike until next Monday. Buenos Aires Herald