MercoPress. South Atlantic News Agency

La Nacion supports Uruguay in bilateral pulp mill dispute

Buenos Aires daily La Nacion Sunday edition comes strongly in support of Uruguay's position and conduct, --so far--, in the pulp mills controversy with Argentina and describes incoming President Cristina Fernandez de Kirchner reference to the issue during her inaugural speech before Congress as “untimely”.

La Nacion points out the gesture of Uruguayan president Tabare Vazquez who in spite of the differences with Argentina over the Botnia plant was present in the taking office ceremony of Cristina Kirchner before the Argentine Congress on December 10 and stoically supported the accusation that Uruguay was to blame for the conflict for "having ignored (violated) the River Uruguay joint management treaty" and unilaterally authorized such construction. The accusation against Uruguay came immediately after Mrs. Kirchner said it was not in her spirit or intention to "deepen the differences" and this was said before a full house and foreign dignitaries with no chance for Mr. Vazquez to reply, underlines La Nacion. The Buenos Aires daily insists the blame statement can be described as "erroneous" since in the official Argentine Executive site, until not so long ago, the "Memory of the Argentine Nation 2004" indicated that "both countries signed a bilateral agreement ending the controversy over the establishment of pulp mills in Fray Bentos" and according to the specific coincidences of both delegations before the River Uruguay Committee (CARU) a plan to monitor the environmental quality of the river in areas with pulp mills, together with the River Uruguay environment protection plan, "contributes to preserve the quality of the water resources". That means that in March 2004 Argentina's Foreign Affairs minister Jorge Bielsa and Uruguay's Didier Opertti had reached an agreement on the pulp mills construction and on a joint monitoring plan. However La Nacion admits the document did not receive the necessary diffusion but the sole mention of CARU, which is the instrument that effectively regulates the 1975 River Uruguay joint management understanding with periodic monitoring of the water course, on both sides, and with the empowerment to present proposals confirms it. Therefore it's hard to sustain the argument that Uruguay violated the 1975 agreement, says La Nacion. Besides Argentina does not have the legal framework for such border and trans border problems and has done no serious, in depth, impartial environment impact assessment study of the situation, nor has it opened such information to the public or given common citizens the chance to access to it, which could have anticipated the social conflicts (pickets and blockading of bridges leading to Uruguay). Finally La Nacion calls on both sides to leave aside "demagoguery", begin a dialogue without hypocrisies ensuring that relations return to their normal, historical course, with a clear predominance of reason and understanding of both positions and interests.