The European Parliament this week approved plans to tighten EU legislation

Date: 18/07/1996

on the prevention of accidents involving dangerous chemicals, but rejected some recommendations from the environment committee for even stricter rules. MEPs approved the Council's common position on updating the 'Seveso' Directive - named after the Italian town where a poisonous cloud of dioxin gas escaped in 1976 - but made several changes. These include the introduction of buffer zones between population centres and dangerous installations, clear rules on accident control procedures and the extension of the directive to landfill sites, harbours, wharfs and marshalling yards. But the full Parliament rejected calls for the directive to be extended to cover nuclear and military installations, believing that this would be unacceptable to member states.