Zaldibar (Bizkaia) (EFE).- The Zaldibar Argitu platform has honored the two workers who died in the landslide three years ago of the landfill in this Biscayan town.
Joaquín Beltrán and Alberto Sololuze have been remembered in the Eitzaga neighborhood with a wreath next to the sculpture installed in their memory.
The Zaldibar Argitu platform has organized, together with the groups and unions of the Euskal Herria Charter of Social Rights, this tribute in which nearly 300 people have participated.
Zaldibar Clarify pide depurar responsibilities
After the intervention of a musician, a resident of this neighborhood, located at the foot of the old landfill, has read a statement in which, on behalf of the Zaldibar Argitu platform, has ensured that the collapse of the dump and the death of both workers “could have been avoided.”
He has also stated that Zaldibar’s “catastrophe” has “direct political responsibilities”, which, he has insisted, must be “clarified and purged”.
Judicial process
In this sense, he recalled that a court in Durango is keeping proceedings open for alleged crimes against the environment in the management of this landfill.
He has indicated that on February 28, several technicians from the Basque Government are called to testify on this matter, for which reason this platform has organized a concentration at the gates of this judicial headquarters.
Specifically, that day three Environmental technicians from the regional Executive are cited as being investigated.
Two of them are cited as technicians belonging to the Inspection Service of the Vice-Ministry for the Environment who were involved in the concession to Verter Recycling – the company responsible for the landfill – of the environmental authorization that “allowed the beginning of the landfill exploitation”.
The third person investigated is cited for his intervention in the “scheduled inspections” at the landfill in 2017.
The Basque Department of Economic Development, Sustainability and the Environment has shown its “absolute collaboration with the judicial process” and maintains that they are the “main stakeholders in everything being clarified.”
In the tribute held this Sunday, on the eve of the third anniversary of the collapse, the representative of the Zaldibar Argitu platform, however, stated that the representatives of the Basque Government have shed “much darkness and little light” on this event.
He has also criticized the fact that none of the members of the autonomous Executive have assumed “direct responsibilities” for this issue.
three years after the collapse
The landfill collapsed on February 6, 2020, burying the two workers. Six months later, the remains of Sololuze’s body were found. The search operation for his partner continued unsuccessfully until May 2021 when he was finally suspended.
The judicial proceeding for the death of the two workers was closed in September 2021 with an agreement between the Prosecutor’s Office and the defendants, the three responsible for Verter Recycling, who assumed responsibility for these deaths by accepting a six-month prison sentence and compensated to the families of the deceased, thus avoiding going to jail. EFE
