China is considering Russia's request that Heilongjiang Province build a temporary dam to block the flow of toxic benzene from a Chinese plant along the Songhua River.

Meanwhile, the central government has sent a team to Russia to study pollution in the Amur River, said Qin Gang, spokesman for the Chinese Foreign Ministry, yesterday. The Amur is called the Heilong River in China, and the Songhua is one of its tributaries.

The team will meet officials from the Russian ministries of foreign affairs and natural resources, and regional governors in the border city of Khabarovsk, Qin said.

The team will also investigate pollution in the Amur River.

On November 13, an explosion occurred at the largely government-owned China National Petroleum Corp in Jilin Province, as chemicals were being transferred.

The blast caused a spill of about 100 tons of benzene, a harmful, carcinogenic chemical.

The exact cause of the accident is under investigation.

The Russian city of Khabarosk, a key urban center in Russia's Far East, relies heavily on boundary water for civil and industrial use and is awaiting the pollution.

The city's water intake is in the lower reaches of the Fuyuan waterway, which joins the Heilong and the Wusuli rivers.

At the request of the Russian side, Heilongjiang Province is considering building a temporary dam project on the Fuyuan waterway to block the flow of the polluted water, said sources of the provincial water resources department.

The Chinese Ministry of Water Resources has sent experts to Jiamusi, Heilongjiang Province, to assess the possibility of building a dam.

The water is shallow and the velocity is almost zero near Jiamusi, a good location for dam construction, authorities said.

Meantime, Jiamusi city was bracing for the benzene onslaught.

Many residents of Jiamusi, the second largest city on the lower reaches of the Songhua River, have left their homes since the front of the pollution slick reached the city on Tuesday night.

Meantime, the Asian Development Bank was speeding up construction of a reservoir for clean water to Harbin. The project is expected to provide clean drinking water to Harbin late next year.