When the small river Raška in South-West Serbia (Sandžak) has passed Novi Pazar flowing northwards to the city of Raška, it already carries about a cocktail of various substances from textile and other industries and a mixed collection of objects as listed in the January 2009 reportage by Prvoslav Karanović following here below.
Yet, what happened in the first days of November 2009 sounded the death knell for this creek in the midst of green hills. Heavy rains made it swelling up to 2.5 meters above its normal water level, and, since the close-by hillsides are quite often used as garbage dump, the torrential flow seized all the rubbish from the lower parts of the slopes while again and again the upper parts sliced behind into the water like in a slow but interminable landslip.
For several kilometers north of Novi Pazar trees and hedgerows alongside Raška river are over and over covered with whatever came to rest at the trunks, on the arms and in the rampantly growing coppice. Wherever the water flooded the adjacent fields thousands and thousands of plastic bottles and bags cover the earth and the remaining Maize crops and cabbages.
Cleaning the landscape from the outcomes of the disaster (which cannot be more than getting it back to its status quo ante) needs an investment of estimated 65 Mio Dinar (= 685.000 € appr.). No chance to fork out such money from any city or state budget in this completely exhausted country.
Cleaning needs to be done very fast in order to avoid further dispsering of garbage to the Ibar and the environment north of the Raška valley.
This „Communication Nr.1“ of the Heinrich Böll Foundation‘s Belgrade office cannot do more than just providing a documentation of the situation on the ground - to whomever it may concern.
The office of the Foundation in cooperation with local partners in Novi Pazar is always ready and willing to receive useful proposals on how to tackle this environmental disaster, as well as to coordinate and organise appropriate accitivites.
(Wolfgang Klotz, Heinrich Böll Foundation)
