Authorities probe tainted water in Shijiazhuang

Allegations that a chemical factory contaminated underground water supplies used for drinking and irrigation are being investigated by the environmental watchdog in Shijiazhuang, Hebei province, officials said on Saturday.

The city government organized an investigative team, which collected water samples from polluted farmland in Xinle - a county-level city - the watchdog said on WeChat.

Investigators have been sent to nearby factories to pinpoint the sources of contamination, and anyone involved in illegal waste discharge will be held accountable, the statement said.

The probe came after Beijing News reported on Thursday that farmers in Xinle's Minzhen village found irrigation water to be "as white as milk", and that it thickened and made the soil white.

Villagers told the newspaper that about 60 families in the neighborhood had stopped drinking the water drawn from their wells several years ago, and started fetching water from elsewhere for culinary use.

The report said villagers suspected that a glasswork factory in neighboring Xingtang county was to blame for the potentially lethal contamination, but did not give the factory's name or the villagers' reasons of their speculation.

Authorities in Xingtang were first alerted to the pollution by provincial environmental inspectors in October, but subsequent water monitoring found no abnormalities in the wells used for irrigation, nor in sewage treatment plants.

Later, the problem was reported to the municipal pollution watchdog, which ordered a re-examination of the complaints.

An investigation in February determined that it was possible the contamination might be related to the remnants of a chemical factory that was shut down in 2014.

Investigators from Xingtang said they collected water samples in February, but the result has not been released.