Members of the Parliament’s commission on environment and regional development paid a fact-finding visit to the hydroelectric plant situated on the Raut River, not far from Branzenii Noi village of Telenesti district. The collected evidence was submitted to the Prosecutor General’s Office, which ordered an investigation. The visit was made in connection with the end-August accident, when the river dried up near Casanesti village and all the fish died following limestone extraction works, IPN reports.

According to the Parliament’s press service, the mayor of Cazanesti Vasile Sarbu said that after the river dried up on August 31, the situation repeated on September 20. Now the Raut recovered. Besides the precarious ecological situation witnessed there, the farmers who use water from the Raut for irrigation were also affected.

Deputy head of the State Ecological Inspectorate Vadim Stangaci said it was established that a business entity extracted and transported illegally 660 cubic meters of limestone. The damage caused to the environment was estimated at over 200,000 lei, while to the soil resources at more than 100,000 lei. Without the authorization of the state ecological authorities, the company also performed works to regulate the river, to set up communications and to do other things that negatively affect the quality of water and the state of rivers.