Israeli violence? What about Palestinian violence?

In the photo by Martin Savoie and caption in a recent issue of the Mirror [The Front, May 7], portraying Israel as a terrorist state on its 50th anniversary, I was looking in vain for the even-handed, well-balanced reporting one tends to find in a reliable newspaper. In the past year, over 100 Israeli Jews were murdered by Palestinian terrorists in open-air markets, restaurant terraces, or pedestrian malls--but no mention in your paper at any time. Is it the current policy to give one-sided, provocative reporting by innuendo?

-- Benjamin Shara

Roy, king of babes

Roy Dupuis got only honourable mention as Most Desirable Male? ["Best of Montreal," April 30] Please. What's wrong up there in Montreal? Are you all blind?

Maybe it's just time for the honour to be shared with others. Fortunately, we just discovered Roy in the last year or so since La Femme Nikita started airing in the U.S. You've had him up there all this time and have tried to keep him a secret. He is the most desirable man to many, many of us who keep the Internet buzzing. That's why I am so incredulous that he is only an honourable mention.

-- Mary Varble,
Memphis, Tennessee

Beach Boys, Rwanda don't mix

Regarding the little note under your logo on the front page of the paper, "Help me: Rwanda," [May 7]: it distresses me that anyone should try to be "clever" or, even worse, want to solicit a laugh or smile regarding such intense human suffering. Where are your heads? Where are your hearts? The Beach Boys have their place, cleverness has its place... but not there! Please be more conscientious about setting an example of human decency in this city.

-- Seth Levinson

Bezonsky begone!

I'm trying to figure out whether the staff at the Mirror are out of their bloody minds. Not only does Josh Bezonsky dump on Montreal by moving to Toronto, but the Mirror decides that rather than simply have his fecal anecdotes smeared in our faces, we deserve regular instalments of the stuff. Whoa, I can do without that kind of crap, thank you.

-- Robert Aubé

Enviro ministry clears the air

In response to your article on PCBs ["Danger: Ship to Quebec," Cover story, March 5], we would like to bring some context to this matter in order to clarify some of the information you presented.

The Government of Quebec holds no responsibility for locating Récupère-Sol's thermal destruction centre in Saint-Ambroise. The decision was made exclusively by the private sector, in order to respond to the need for definitive solutions for the treatment of contaminated soils and to the laws of supply and demand in that sector of activity.

The permit issued Oct. 27, 1997, to Récurère-Sol inc. authorizes only the treatment of contaminated soils. In Quebec, soil is considered a constitutive element of the environment, just like water or the atmosphere. Under the law, contaminated soils are not considered waste. This regulation also makes clear that soils with more than 50 ppm of PCBs cannot be kept in permanent storage.

Thus, it is incorrect to state that the ministry of the environment is using this "loophole" to permit the creation of either storage sites or treatment centres without public consultation. The reason is that the regulations on environmental impact assessments do not cover this type of project for treating contaminated soils. Furthermore, since contaminated soils are not considered hazardous waste, the thermal process used for treating contaminated soils does not correspond with the definition of "incinerator" in the regulations on the evaluation and examination of the quality of the atmosphere.

According to information supplied by General Electric and Récupère-Sol, the contaminated soils contracted for treatment in February and March had a concentration of about 230 ppm, not, as you state, "with concentrations often exceeding 20,000 ppm."

You mention that 450,000 tonnes of contaminated soils from across Canada are housed at a storage site in LaSalle. According to records of materials stored between 1990 and September 1997, 80 per cent of the soils come from the greater Montreal region, 16 per cent from the rest of Quebec and 4 per cent from other provinces. Soils contaminated with PCBs constitute 2 per cent of the site's volume, 1 per cent of which comes from other provinces (mostly Ontario).

-- Denys Jean
Assistant Deputy Minister of the
Environment, Government of Quebec