Reports from the United Arab Emirates say a desalination plant in the Gulf emirate of Sharjah has been closed to prevent contamination by an oil slick in the Gulf.

The reports say another water plant, in Ajman, was closed yesterday Monday for the second time in a week.

The oil escaped from a barge which sank last week after running aground off Umm al-Qaiwain.

The reports say it has spread along eighty kilometers of coast from Sharjah in the south to Ras al Khaimah in the north.

Salvage experts managed to seal the barge, but they say it is in such poor condition that another 6000 tonnes of oil could leak out onto the country's beaches.

The clean-up aims to remove the oil into the desert

An international operation is already underway to clean up oil from the coastline and dump it in the desert. There is still no official word on where the oil-barge had come from or where it was heading.

The BBC correspondent in the United Arab Emirates says many people believe it was carrying heavy fuel oil smuggled out of Iraq in defiance of United Nations sanctions.

From the newsroom of the BBC World Service
 

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