Germany and Poland are setting up a joint task force to tackle a massive fish die-off in the Oder River between their two countries.

The German Environment Ministry announced the move on Monday after a meeting in Szczecin in northwest Poland on Sunday evening that was attended by environment ministers from both countries.

“The experts are working at full speed on the analyses to find out as quickly as possible which substances and causes led to the mass death of the fish and the damage to the Oder River,’’ German Environment Minister Steffi Lemke said.

So far, there were no conclusions on what exactly caused tonnes of fish to wash up on the banks of the river.

The incident has provoked complaints from Berlin that Warsaw did not pass on information about the deaths quickly enough.

In spite of the warnings of environmental damage further downstream, no fish carcasses have yet been sighted in the state of Mecklenburg-Vorpommern on the German Baltic coast, officials said. 

(dpa/NAN)