Press Release, August 27, 2013

A round table on Moscow’s environmental problems with Sergei Mitrokhin’s participation was conducted at A.N.Bakh Institute of Biochemistry of the Russian Academy of Sciences (RAS) on August 27.

First Deputy Chair of the Moscow branch of YABLOKO Galina Mikhaleva opened the meeting. She asked the present ecologists and the representatives of the initiative groups to make amends to Sergei Mitrokhin’s environmental programme and to put forward their proposals.

Alexei Yablokov, member of the RAS, Chair of YABLOKO’s Green Russia faction, presented a second more extensive edition of his book “The environment and the health of Muscovites”. He mentioned that for the first time the book touched the question of soling the environmental and health problems at the same time.

Yablokov took the research of the USA Bureau of Land Management as an example. The research shows that the trees are part of public health: “One tree in the city is one saved life within a year”. But Russia’s Health Department doesn’t want to know anything about the environment. And the amount of trees in the city decrease.

According to Yablokov, Moscow has a a very bad health and environmental statistics. The scientist said there was no such a department responsible for radiation safety in Moscow.

Sergei Mitrokhin mainly focused on the conditions of Moscow’s parks which suffer from the authorities’ actions. The authorities install paving tiles, roll out lawns instead of the natural soil covering, open restaurants. Sergei Mitrokhin inspected the problems of many Moscow’s parks in person.

“When we talk about the protection of parks and green territories we mean not just a place for a good rest, but we talk about saving of lives and health”, said YABLOKO leader.

“The money from the budget is spent on all those roll lawns. The distraction of the parks takes place under the pretence of redevelopment. Moreover,the present authorities patronise different commercials. There are lots of illegal cafes and parking spaces in the parks. The main thing that the authorities take away from us is the nature”, said Sergei Mitrokhin.

Candidate for Moscow Mayor presented his environmental programme and added that not all the candidates have it. What is more, he [Mitrokhin] has a team which can bring this programme to life. Mitrokhin mentioned that YABLOKO had been concerned with the environmental problems for a long time and it’s not just pre-election public relations. And YABLOKO will continue its environmental activity no matter what results would they have at the elections.

“I’m the only “green candidate” at the Moscow Mayoral elections. We don’t fell shame for running in the elections at the face of the environmental community”, said Mitrokhin.

Evgeny Frolov, co-chair of the environmental and social organisations union, approved of Sergei Mitrokhin’s programme and said that “it will be very difficult to achieve anything in the environmental sphere without a political will”.

Sergei Minzheritsky, coordinator of a social movement “The open bank”, said:” YABLOKO is the only party which struggles for the nature in Moscow, for the back-link between the people and the authorities.

Grigory Semyonov, a municipal deputy in the Cheremushky district, member of YABLOKO, said that, according to the latest research, the most green districts of Moscow are the five-storied block of flats districts. He proposed to develop a programme on knocking those blocks of flats down without the damage to the nature together with the ecologists, deputies, residents and city planners.

The participants of the round table discussed the most important environmental problems: the protection of parks and the prospect of giving them the status of the specially protected nature reservations, air pollution and planting of greenery.

Alexei Yablokov mentioned that the only way to attract the attention of the authorities is mass protest. But Sergei Mitrokhin disagreed. He said that mass rallies don’t solve all the problems.”The main issue now is the issue of the authority.It’s hard to achieve the change of the authorities in one time, but if we don’t try and don’t get experience in the struggle, nothing will change”, said the candidate for Moscow Mayor.

At the end of the discussion Galina Mikhaleva invited everyone to the rally in the Strogino district against the construction of the road on August 31.