President Lee Myung-bak strongly rebuked officials Tuesday for mishandling a devastating gas leak in southeastern South Korea, ordering the Cabinet to determine what went wrong and who was responsible.
The government has been under fire for bungling its initial response to the Sept. 27 leak of about eight tons of hydrofluoric acid, an acute poison, from a chemical plant in the southeastern city of Gumi. Five workers were killed, 18 others injured and more than 3,000 people sickened as a result of the leak.
Firefighters failed to use calcium hydroxide, a neutralizing agent for hydrofluoride, initially and the local authorities were slow to evacuate factory workers and residents in nearby regions. A danger warning was lifted too early, only a day after the spill, without properly assessing the damages.
"Why is there no mention of how the warning was lifted just the following day and where the responsibility lies?" Lee said during a Cabinet meeting, according to presidential spokesman Park Jeong-ha. "The Prime Minister's Office should clearly find out how the warning was lifted early and why the initial response was insufficient, so as to determine where the responsibility lies."
The gas leak left crops and fruit on more than 212 hectares of farmlands and orchards withered, and some 3,200 livestock animals drooling heavily or showing symptoms similar to a cold. It has also cost factories in the industrial complex about 17.7 billion won (US$15.9 million) in lost production.
On Monday, the government designated the affected areas as a special disaster zone. (Yonhap)