Denmark holds 'funeral' for a polluted fjord
The Peninsula
Vejle, Denmark: A fjord in the east of Denmark received last rites on Saturday from a group of local activists in an effort to draw attention to the p...
Vejle, Denmark: A fjord in the east of Denmark received last rites on Saturday from a group of local activists in an effort to draw attention to the poor health of the country's coastal waters.
About a thousand people gathered alongside the Vejle Fjord to celebrate an open air "funeral" for the inlet in the west of the country, which has been asphyxiated by industrial agricultural run-offs.
"We mark this as a sorrowful event. Last year, we had the most heavy deoxygenation in 25 years in Denmark," Christian Fromberg, who organised the event for Greenpeace, told AFP in English.
Biologist Stiig Markager from the University of Aarhus said Vejle was a "dead fjord" because the lack of oxygen has killed off its fauna and flora.
"Thirty years ago we could catch fish here. Now there is nothing. The seabed is totally polluted. There is no life" said local resident Hugues Dedieu.
