Russian environmentalists say President Vladimir Putin is attempting to quash the country’s budding ecological movement in the name of economic progress, and because the former Communist stronghold is the world's largest nation -- bordering three oceans and 14 countries -- any environmental damage likely will have worldwide repercussions, the San Francisco Chronicle reports.
The continued persecution of journalists and activists -- including Alexander Nikitin, a former naval officer who reported on Russian nuclear contamination -- by law enforcement officials, and Putin’s move to transfer the Federal Forest Service and the State Committee on Environmental Protection to the Ministry of Natural Resources (MNR) have alarmed environmentalists around the planet.
The MNR has previously done little more than provide licenses for gas and oil development, logging and water resource permits. Many observers say existing regulations will now likely be loosened, the Chronicle reports.
The MNR is being criticized by several opponents of the plan, including the former head of the Ecojuris Institute, a Russian environmental law group, and the Sierra Club. Sixty-seven environmental organizations signed a petition and forwarded it to World Bank President James Wolfensohn, urging that he reconsider a new $60 million loan to Russia until Putin rescinds the plan, the newspaper reports.
The World Bank maintains that Putin is justified by expanding the ministry’s jurisdiction, the Chronicle reports. Environmental activists disagree.
"It is exactly because they were trying to enforce the environmental laws that the Committee for Environmental Protection was shut down," Ivan Blokov, a member of Greenpeace Russia, told the newspaper. "There are good environmental laws in this country. The problem is that the government repeatedly has tried to stop their proper implementation."
Russia has been cited as the most polluted place on the planet. An estimated 61 million of the country's 150 million people live in extremely polluted local environments; air pollution is five times greater than acceptable levels in 120 cities; and faulty pipelines leak one million tons of oil into Russia’s water and soil every month –- the equivalent of 25 Exxon Valdez spills, the Chronicle reports.
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