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BEIJING - Chinese officials said Monday that private milk-collecting stations were likely at fault for a rapidly unfolding scandal over tainted infant formula that has left two babies dead and nearly 600 ill.
The New Zealand partner to the Chinese company Sanlu at the centre of the storm went further, saying the contamination amounted to sabotage.
All 19 people detained so far in a nationwide probe into how the chemical melamine came to contaminate the formula are from the stations, which pick up milk from dairy farmers, the state-controlled China Daily said.
"It's unlikely that dairy farmers mixed the industrial chemical melamine in fresh milk," it quoted Li Changjiang, who heads the General Administration of Quality Supervision, Inspection and Quarantine, as saying.
He added: "We believe the contamination is more likely to have occurred at milk-collecting stations."
This is in contrast to initial statements from Sanlu Group, the company at the centre of the scandal, which fingered dairy farmers for the contamination, the paper said.
The Xinhua news agency said two brothers in northern China's Hebei province -- who are among the 19 detained -- had been formally arrested for allegedly selling three tonnes of contaminated milk per day from their station.
The duo allegedly decided to add melamine after Sanlu repeatedly rejected their milk for failing to meet standards, it added, citing Hebei police.
Melamine, which is used for making plastics and glues, may have been added to make the milk appear it contained more protein than was actually the case, Chinese media have suggested.
Xinhua reported that two babies, both in northwest China's Gansu province, had now been confirmed dead after drinking the contaminated milk powder.
Nationwide, the number of babies sick with kidney stones after drinking the formula has risen to about 580, up from 432, the China Daily said.
In Gansu province alone there were 223 babies and infants suffering kidney stones, which are unusual among young children, the Gansu Daily said.
Chinese inspectors have fanned out into major milk-producing regions to try to contain the developing scandal, media reported.
In Gansu province, they found melamine in samples selected at random from Haoniu Dairy Co., a partner of Sanlu Group but which produces under the Sanlu trademark, according to Xinhua.
"The products of Haoniu have been sealed up," Gansu Vice Governor Xian Hui told the agency.
Sanlu, in which New Zealand dairy giant Fonterra has a 43 per cent stake, is a relatively inexpensive brand favoured by poor rural women.
Use of infant formula is growing in China as women from the countryside go to work in the cities and so are unable to breastfeed their own children.
Fonterra's chief executive Andrew Ferrier alleged the contamination was the result of third-party sabotage of raw milk supplied to Sanlu.
"In this case we frankly have sabotage of a product," he said.
"Our hearts go out to the parents and the infants who were affected."
Speaking to New Zealand reporters by video from Singapore, he said Fonterra had known of the contamination in early August and wanted an immediate recall but Sanlu had to abide by Chinese rules.
"We together with Sanlu have done everything that we possibly could to get the product off the shelf," Ferrier said.
Asked why Fonterra had not gone public earlier, he said it would have been "irresponsible" for Sanlu not to have followed the guidelines set by Chinese authorities.
"We as a minority shareholder had to continue to push Sanlu. Sanlu had to work with their own government to follow the procedures that they were given," he said.
New Zealand Prime Minister Helen Clark said her government learned of the contamination problem on September 5, then "blew the whistle" three days later by informing Beijing after local Chinese officials refused to act. - AFP/vm
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