The taps were turned off in Jiamusi, home to 550,000 people, Sunday as the potentially lethal chemical pool approached along the Songhua river in China's northeast province of Heilongjiang, the China Daily reported.

Warnings were posted along the river bank in Jiamusi ordering people not to draw water from the river, or to swim or fish in it, according to the paper.

Jiamusi and other large cities along the Songhua river are paying the price of one of the country's worst industrial accidents on record in recent years.

A blast at a chemical plant upstream on November 13 released 100 tonnes of benzene and nitrobenzene into the Songhua, which provides much of the drinking water to urban communities in northeast China.

The ramifications of the accident dawned upon China and the world late last month as the slick passed through Harbin, a city of nearly four million urban residents, causing the water supply to be cut for five days.

The area may have to live with the aftermath of the toxic spill for a long time to come, the report suggested.

Li Haitao, mayor of Jiamusi, warned the pollutants were likely to form sediments on the banks of an island in the river, resulting in long-term contamination of drinking water.

As the toxic slick moves downriver, it will eventually enter into Russia, highlighting the cross-border nature of much pollution that is taking place in modern China.

Chinese authorities are filing daily reports to the Russian side about the situation in the Songhua river, according to the paper.

As of late Sunday, the slick was still 340 kilometers (210 miles) from Sanjiangkou, where the Songhua meets the Amur, the border river dividing Russia and China, the paper said.

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