Listen to part of a radio programme and answer the questions. 1 Who or what was found dead? 2 Has the outbreak been stopped?

1 Thousands of seals

2 No, it hasn’t.

3 A disastrous ecological situation in the region, which is caused by drilling for oil.

Tapescript (Ex. 5A)

Thousands of dead seals have been found along Kazahstan\'s Caspian Sea coast, in an outbreak that officials blame on unusually warm weather but environmental experts say it is connected with oil pollution.

Workers have collected the bodies of 11000 dead seals. Makhambet Khakimov, the head of the environmental group Caspian Nature, said the outbreak was still spreading and researchers from his organization were finding more dead seals along the shore. Mr Khakimov said that the Astrakhan Fishing Institute had concluded that the seals were killed by an infectious disease which hit the animals when their immune systems had been weakened by oil-related pollutants in the sea.

‘The real reason is that the animals\' immune system was weakened. It happens because of a disastrous ecological situation in the region, which is caused by drilling for oil,” he said. The worlds surviving seals face new threats, especially pollution as well as...