23:30, 16 February 2010

Russian ecologists suspend cooperation with "Olympstroy"

Sochi administration advertising. The inscription says: "Sochi 2014. Development strategy. Municipal transport fleet is to be twice and a half enlarged". Photo by the "Caucasian Knot"

As reported by Igor Chestin, head of the Russian representative office of the WWF (World Wildlife Fund), Russian ecologists have suspended their cooperation with the State Corporation (SC) "Olympstroy", in charge of preparing the Sochi Olympiad-2014, because their joint decisions on protection of the regional ecosystems are not fulfilled. The "Olympstroy" treats the ecologists' demarche as a complete surprise. In the opinion of the builders, ecologists "have taken a non-constructive stand" and mislead the public.

"I feel great respect to those 'Olympstroy' officials, with whom we worked, and, as a rule, we reached similar formulation of problems and offered similar solutions," said Mr Chestin. However, as he said, "the problem is that these joint decisions are not fulfilled; and it's now obvious that fulfilment is beyond the competence of 'Olympstroy'," the "Echo Moskvy" Radio reports.

"Russian organizations are unable to affect the situation; therefore we try to reach the UNESCO; and we wait for their commission this spring," said Igor Chestin. "So far, we've suspended our cooperation with 'Olympstroy' and now study our future quit from ecological accompaniment of the Sochi Olympiad."

The Greenpeace activists are ready to join the WWF ecologists, as the Radio reports.

In their turn, officials from "Olympstroy" said that the ecologists' demarche was a full surprise for them. "Many of their proposed measures have been or are being implemented," the SC's press service reports.

The builders state that ecologists "have taken a non-constructive position" and mislead the public. "The fact that the WWF made this statement during the Olympiad in Vancouver evidences that the ecologists want to spoil the image of our Olympic competitions before those who are present there," said Konstantin Tsybko, former head of the public board at the "Rosprirodnadzor" (Russian Federal Service for Nature Supervision) and now coordinator of the "Edinaya Rossiya" (United Russia) Party on ecological matters.