"We have no choice but to accept our guilt and try to build up again.The term spill in Excel's literature is defined as populating multiple cells with a single formula. "You can't hide this kind of thing," the Doosan Group official said. "People are tired of bad working conditions and bad living conditions."īut some industrial officials remain philosophical. Yoon, the environmental agency administrator. "I think it has to do with a sudden sense of affluence in Korea," said Mr. A plan to build a titanium operation in Korea has encountered strong opposition from environmentalists. Chemical-laden rivers and air fouled with exhaust make for a potent target.
The bitterness of those wage disputes have added to public suspicions about the "chaebol," Korea's giant industrial groups. Roh to power, the country was shaken by strikes in some industries. Soon after the elections that brought Mr. The intense reaction against Doosan seems to underscore the growing conflict here between industrial companies unaccustomed to being questioned and a public that got its first taste of real political power only four years ago. "It smelled so awful that you vomited when you go near it," said T. The reaction of the chemical with the water created an overpowering stench that made the water virtually undrinkable, residents say. Prosecutors charge that the company waited hours to report the accident, making it impossible for the authorities to shut off water supplies in time.īut the amount of phenol was so large, it may have saved many residents from further illness or even death. The pipe leaked at least 30 tons of pure concentrated phenol into the river. The leak that prompted the newest protests started when an underground pipe leading from an outdoor tank to the Doosan factory burst. Roh's Cabinet is also considering a plan to create special regions near tap-water sources where no new factories could be built. The boards house the internal controls for everything from television sets to microwave ovens. Doosan makes 80 percent of the printed circuit boards produced in Korea. Last week, the large Doosan plant, which has been shut since the accident occurred on March 14, was reopened to reduced production. But the official, the head of another part of the Doosan Group, said many of the charges were false, including contentions that Doosan was slow to alert officials or people who rely on the water supply. "If we explain everything, it will only inflame people," said a senior Doosan official, giving a recent visitor a tour of the plant while it was closed. Instead, company officials say, they must sit back and absorb the criticism, and make explanations later. But it says that under Korean tradition, it cannot really defend itself while it is the focus of public controversy. No Denial by Doosanĭoosan has not denied that it was the source of the phenol leak. The plant in the current pollution case, the Doosan Electro-Materials Company, is 40 percent owned by a unit of Allied-Signal Inc. Kumi, just west of Taegu, is jammed not only with Korean companies but also with Japanese and American joint ventures. "For Korean businesses, protecting the environment is just another way to cut into profits. "For years, Koreans accepted this kind of thing as the price of development," said Yoon Myung Hyun, the administrator of the area's environmental agency. Six have been indicted on charges of industrial pollution and negligence, among other offenses, and all remain in jail. To drive home the point that a new era of environmentalism had suddenly begun, prosecutors also locked up many of the region's environmental inspectors, suggesting they were negligent or were paid to look the other way. The plant was closed and the managers overseeing it were quickly imprisoned. Roh announced a rapid rethinking of South Korea's industrialization policies.
The incident has turned into South Korea's most politically charged industrial pollution case, one that could galvanize the country much the way the more severe mercury poisoning cases in Minamata, Japan, became a symbol of industrialization gone awry a generation ago.Īnd true to their passionate style, demonstrators took to the streets in Taegu, demanding punishment for the offending company, the Doosan Group, and beginning a boycott of Coca-Cola and Kentucky Fried Chicken, among other products that Doosan holds the franchises for in Korea.Īfter hurried Cabinet meetings in Seoul, Mr. The water flowed to 1.7 million people, and hundreds, perhaps thousands, became violently ill.