The Aitik copper mine is owned by Boliden also responsible for the toxic spill in April 1998 that devastated the Dosana wetland in southern Spain. The dam collapse in Sweden is only months after the cyanide spill in January from the Baia Mare mine in Romania. It is just a matter of time before there is another more serious accident involving mining waste. The only questions are when and where. The accident in Sweden shows that too many mining waste dams, east and west, are not properly built or maintained.
New legislation is needed before another disaster strikes.
A new Directive should be brought in regulating the design, construction, maintence and monitoring of mining waste dams. WWF s recommendations were taken seriously by the European Commission following the Baia Mare disaster but two years after the Donana disaster and almost nine months after Baia Mare it is still not clear what the European Union proposes to do about mining waste safety or when. The Swedish mining waste dam collapse, four months before the Swedish Presidency, will lead to renewed calls for action.