State Council orders nationwide inspection as chemical plant deaths rise to 78
State Council orders nationwide inspection of chemical industries
An urgent notice issued by the Work Safety Committee of the State Council asked authorities related to safety production nationwide to strictly follow the instruction President Xi Jinping made after the Thursday blast in a chemical industry park in Xiangshui county of Jiangsu.
The notice from the State Council, released on Monday, deployed a thorough examination on potential hazards of dangerous chemicals across the country. All chemical industry parks should undergo safety risk assessments, it said.
Local safety production authorities should conduct careful inspections on nitration-related processing plants and enterprises that produce or store nitrated compounds, according to the notice.
Law enforcement in the sector should be intensified and not be a flash in the pan. "(We should) make the law enforcement 'bite', and severely punish those enterprises and individuals that are indifferent to laws and lives," the notice said.
