Germany could have poisoned Oder river, says Polish official

The environmental disaster in the Oder could have been caused in Germany, says the Polish government official responsible for water management. He also accused Berlin of exploiting the crisis to block Polish redevelopment of the river.

By contrast, Poland’s prime minister has said that there are growing indications that the poisoning of the river, which has caused hundreds of tonnes of dead fish to wash up, is a “natural event”. But the German environment minister insists the crisis is “man made”.

“The Nord Stream [gas pipelines] should be a warning that nothing can be agreed with the German side regarding the security of our country and we will certainly not do it in relation to the revitalisation of the Oder,” tweeted Marek Gróbarczyk, a deputy infrastructure minister and the government’s plenipotentiary for water management.

His remarks were prompted by comments from German environment minister Steffi Lemke, who told Deutsche Welle that Poland’s ambitions to economically develop the Oder “must be stopped” as they will “further destroy this valuable ecosystem”.

Lemke was referring to Polish plans – predating the current environmental crisis – to deepen and widen the river and create a system of barrages and a container terminal. She had previously voiced opposition to the idea during a visit to Warsaw in February.

In further tweets yesterday, Gróbarczyk described Lemke’s latest remarks as “scandalous” and “nothing more than the Germans fighting competition by inhibiting our investments” and “acting to the detriment of Poland”. He reiterated that “modernisation of the Oder is a priority for us” and “we will not take a step back”.

In an interview with conservative news website wPolityce, Gróbarczyk claimed that there is a “very methodical operation by the Germans…to block our investments”, and that Lemke’s comments are the “latest German invasion”.

The deputy minister said he “would not be surprised if it turned out that the sources of infection of the Oder are located in Germany, and all this was meant to inhibit investment processes” on the Polish side of the river.

Although a large part of the Oder flows along the Polish-German border, the first cases of mass fish deaths were reported upstream in Poland, well before the river reaches Germany. However, Gróbarczyk pointed to a recent case in which a German-owned tannery in Poland discharged industrial waste into the Bóbr river.

Lemke also met yesterday with her Polish counterpart Anna Moskwa, who like Gróbarczyk made clear that Poland “sees no reason to stop the [planned] works on the Oder”. She emphasised that the investment is intended to help mitigate flooding and droughts.

Likewise, in his remarks to wPolityce Gróbarczyk argued that Poland’s planned investments in river infrastructure would help to prevent the kind of crisis occurring at the moment, by regulating water levels, which this year have been very low.

Earlier this month, Moskwa also hit out against Germany, accusing media there of spreading “fake news” about the environmental disaster in the Oder, the causes of which are yet to be fully determined.

Last week, Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki told state broadcaster TVP that “there are ever more indications this was a natural event” and that “the Oder will regenerate quickly”. However, Lemke declared yesterday that “man-made discharges” were part of the reason for the crisis.

Main image credit: Cezary Aszkielowicz / Agencja Wyborcza.pl

Daniel Tilles

Daniel Tilles is editor-in-chief of Notes from Poland. He has written on Polish affairs for a wide range of publications, including Foreign Policy, POLITICO Europe, EUobserver and Dziennik Gazeta Prawna.