‘The smell hurts’: why has the supreme court washed its hands of Argentina’s ‘rotten river’?

In 2008, Argentina’s supreme court issued a historic ruling demanding the cleanup of the Matanza-Riachuelo river in Buenos Aries, considered one of the most polluted in the world. Photograph: Ricardo Ceppi/Getty Images

Two decades ago, the waters in Argentina’s basin flowed over abandoned shipwrecks and rusting cars. Animal residue from abattoirs bled into its rivers, along with household waste and toxins from factories, including arsenic, lead and cadmium.

Today, those living along the riverbanks, which snake around Buenos Aires’ southern edge and by the tourist district of La Boca, continue to complain of skin rashes, headaches, breathing problems and vomiting. They say their animals die inexplicably.