MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

Uruguay blocks bridge to prevent pickets crossing

Uruguayan Police blocking the bridge at the border with Argentina

Uruguay announced on Friday precautionary security measures in the area surrounding a controversial pulp mill that late Thursday was given the green light to begin production to which Argentina objects, generating a serious diplomatic rift between Montevideo and Buenos Aires.

Uruguayan Interior and Defence ministries sources said the bridge linking with Argentina from Fray Bentos where the pulp mill is located, has been shut down for the next 48 hours and an air exclusion three miles radius area has been imposed over the disputed plant. The decision was taken in coordination with President Tabare Vazquez currently at the Ibero-American summit in Chile where the situation with Argentina has become extremely tense following several frustrated meetings in spite of conciliatory speeches and a serious exchange of Vazquez with President Nestor Kirchner in the corridors of the meeting that has convened leaders from 22 countries. Argentine picketers and environmentalists who have been for the last two years protesting the construction of the pulp mill, blocking the bridge from the Argentine side, announced a massive air, river and land demonstration for Saturday. "Our objective is to keep things quiet", said a police force source adding that the measure could be extended to the other two bridges linking Uruguay with Argentina further north. The decision means no pedestrian or vehicle movements across the bridge linking Fray Bentos with the Argentine city of Gualeguaychu that has been at the heart of the protests against Finland's Botnia plant, which allegedly will be contaminating for the environment.