Hello everyone, this is ambassador from Paju. As you guys already know, my main concentration is on foot-and-mouth disease that was prevalent in last year and early this year. Well for this month, I wanted to cover the environmental conditions in Paju after all the natural disasters; and also simply after the hot summer.

Before reading my article, I just wanted to mention that while I researched about Paju?s current condition, I found out there are different views concerning the seriousness of pollution level between the government and the public. I am going to briefly mention two different ?conditions? in Paju presented by two different groups, so I will appreciate if you guys express your opinions.

First, according to the government, there is not a noticeable damage in the city. The government reported that even after the heavy rain, any big damage wasn?t reported.

However, according to the public, it was said that after the burial in last December, there has always been oil leaking out. Oil even formed a tide and was even combined with sharp odor. Therefore, buried carcasses were dug out and were once again buried inside vinyl houses. Against the expectation, on nowadays, oil is once again leaking out and flowing to the private houses; moreover, shockingly, there are even cow bones lying on the ground.

Moreover, it was found that soil mixed up with the leaking oil was slipped during the landslide. In addition, there are jelly-looking oil pools.

Personally, whether the government?s report is true or not, still we have to pay attention on the public?s voice. The public who?s speaking of their own may be quite small; however, having even only one person expressing his/her discomfort after the foot-and-mouth disease must be paid attention to since foot-and-mouth disease is not a problem only for a specific person. I heard that there is a conflict on verifying leachate (leaked liquid) because there are no definite scientific criteria concerning the verification. So, we will have to pay more attention on real current condition in Paju and invest more money on science laboratory to make a definite guidelines on not only confirming leachate, but also other diseases.