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The Newsletter of
the
Socio-Ecological Union
A Center for Coordination
and Information
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Moscow, Russia -- Issue 10(32),
December, 2002
IN THIS ISSUE:
THE "PRESTIGE" DISASTER AND ENVIRONMENTAL SECURITY
THE "PRESTIGE" DISASTER AND ENVIRONMENTAL SECURITY OF THE BALTIC SEA
Statement of the environmental NGOs
November 13-19, 2002. The coast of Spain has become the site of another large-scale environmental
disaster. The tanker "Prestige" operating under the Bahamas flag and managed by a Greece company
broke in two and sank resulting in spilling over 20 thousand tons of heavy fuel oil into the sea.
Environmental and economic losses are enormous. Just 3 years ago an accident at a similar tanker,
"Erica", that also resulted in a huge oil spill, took place near the coast of France. The latest
"Prestige" disaster proves that the issue of preventing accidents of this type and scale on European
Union seashores has not been resolved.
It is our special concern that the old, single-hulled "Prestige" was used for transportation of
Russian oil being exported through the Baltic Sea. In the near future, the volume of these exports
is expected to increase substantially. For this purpose both already existing Baltic Sea oil
terminals in Tallinn-Muuga (Estonia), Ventspills (Latvia), Klaipeda (Lithuania), and newly
constructed ones in Butinge (Lithuania), Primorsk and Vysotsk (Russia) will be used.
In the environmentally very fragile, semi-closed and small-size Baltic Sea an oil spill comparable
in size with the "Prestige" and "Erica" accidents will lead to completely disastrous consequences
affecting not only seashores of the countries directly involved in Russian oil exports (Russia,
Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania), but also many other countries with access to the Baltic sea or its
straits to the North Sea (Finland, Sweden, Poland, Germany, Denmark and Norway). Such accidents can
trigger serious strains in relations between Russia and the European Union.
Non-governmental organizations that have signed this Statement, are convinced that the following
measures must be implemented:
1. International Environmental Impact Assessments of the Baltic Sea oil projects including the
transportation stage. The assessments should be carried on in an open transparent way and create
opportunities for effective participation of all stakeholders. Risks assessments must be based on
the potential maximum-scale accident, including complete destruction of facilities and
installations.
2. Companies engaged in Baltic Sea oil projects must commit themselves to implementing measures
necessary for preventing serious environmental accidents and provide maximum transparency in this
regard.
3. Development of a Plan for transferring all oil and petroleum products exports through the Baltic
Sea to using only double-hulled tankers in shortest possible time.
4. Creation of the Information System covering movements of oil tankers in the Baltic Sea, first of
all, for old and single-hulled vessels regularly suffering from accidents or having operational
problems. There should also be an information system for accidents that have resulted in oil spills
or created conditions for such spills, and their environmental consequences.
5. Development of plans and regular trainings to prepare personnel for large (more than 10 thousand
tons of oil) spills, comparable in size with the "Prestige" and "Erica" accidents.
6. Funding of rescue and clean-up operations dealing with large oil spills in the Baltic Sea.
7. Implementation of measures improving transparency and access to information about environmental
problems of Baltic Sea oil projects and implementation of measures necessary to enhance their
environmental safety.
Subscribed by:
Socio-Ecological Union International
Greenpeace Russia
World Wildlife Fund for Nature
and
Russia
Agentstvo Volzhskoi Ekologicheskoi Informatsii - I.Fufaeva, Russia, Nizhnii Novgorod
Amur Socio Ecological Union - S.Titova, Russia, Blagoveshchensk
Assotsiatsiia zelenykh Karelii - D.Rybakov, Russia, Petrozavodsk
Baikal Environmental Wave - M.Rikhvanova, Russia, Irkutsk
Baltiiskii resursno-informatsionnyi tsentr - A.Koroleva, Russia, Kaliningrad
Biuro regional'nykh obshchestvennykh kampanii (BROK) - A.Lebedev, Russia, Vladivostok
Volgodonsk regional department of SEU - V.Shalimov, Russia, Volgodonsk
WWF RPO - I.Chestin, Russia, Moscow
Grazhdanskii Tsentr iadernogo nerasprostraneniia - V.Mikheev, Russia, Krasnoiarsk
Greenpeace Russia - S.Tsyplenkov, Russia, Moscow
Dal'nevostochnaia Koalitsiia organizatsii - A.Semenov, Russia, Vladivostok
Zelenyi mir - O.Bodrov, Russia, Sosnovyi Bor
Initsiativnaia gruppa "Molodezhnyi vek" - I.Nevrova, Russia, Vladivostok
Kaspiiskaia programma ISAR - A.Knizhnikov, Russia, Moscow
Kol'skii Koordinatsionnyi tsentr "Geia" - E.Kruglikova, Russia, Apatity
Kostromskoe oblastnoe obshchestvennoe ekologicheskoe dvizhenie "Vo imia zhizni" - T.Dobretsova,
Russia, Kostroma
International Socio Ecological Union - S.Zabelin, Russia, Moscow
Mezhregional'noe obshchestvennoe dvizhenie "Za bez"iadernyi Don" - I.Reznikova, Russia, Volgodonsk
OO ecological club "Rostok" - L.Samchinskaia, Russia, g.Partizansk
OO ecological club "Raduga" - A.Kaminskii, Russia, g.Artem
OO ecological studio "Rodnichok" - S.Dovbysh, Russia, g.Vladivostok
Public Environmental Organization "Zelenaia volna" - N.Zhilkin, Russia, Volgodonsk
Parusnaia akademiia - V.Nazarenko, Russia, Taganrog
Proekt-Perekrestok Tsivilizatsii - L.Savel'eva, Russia, Volgograd
Newspaper "Bereginia" - T.Selivanovskaia, Russia, Nizhnii Novgorod
Respublikanskii pravozashchitnyi tsentr - E.Kislov, Russia, Ulan-Ude
Sibirskoe ekologicheskoe Agentstvo - A.Toropov, Russia, Tomsk.
Sotsial'no-ekologicheskoe obshchestvo "Zelenaia Dubna" - A.Sumbaev, Russia, Dubna
Soiuz "Za khimicheskuiu bezopasnost'" - L.Fedorov, Russia, Moscow
Ul'ianovskoe gorodskoe otdelenie VOOP - A.Bragin, Russia, Ul'ianovsk
Biodiversity Conservation Center - A.Zimenko, Russia, Moscow
Tsentr ekologicheskoi politiki Rossii - A.Iablokov, Russia, Moscow
TsKI Lipetskogo SoES - A.Fedorov, Russia, Lipetsk
Chukotskoe obshchestvennoe ekologicheskoe ob"edinenie "Kaira-klub" - G.Smirnov, Russia, Anadyr'
Ekozashchita! - P.Malyshev, Russia, Kaliningrad
Sakhalin Environmental Watch - D.Lisitsyn, Russia, Iuzhno-Sakhalinsk
Ekologicheskoe dvizhenie molodezhi Chuvashskoi Respubliki - E.Osmelkin, Russia, Cheboksary
Ukraine
Assotsiatsiia "Nash dom" - Iu.Vasidlov, Ukraine, Ivano-Frankovsk
Institut problem rynka i ekonomiko-ekologicheskikh issledovanii - A.Krisilov, Ukraine, Odessa
Molodezhnyi ekologicheskii tsentr im. Vernadskogo - T.Chernaia, Ukraine, Odessa
Natsional'nyi ekologicheskii tsentr Ukrainy - Iu.Urbanskii, Ukraine, Kiev
Obshchestvennaia ekologicheskaia organizatsiia "Vozrozhdenie" - I.Vykhristiuk, Ukraine, Odessa
Obshchestvo toksikologov Ukrainy, - L.Shafran, Ukraine, Odessa
Odessa Regional Academy of Sciences - V.Degtiarenko, Ukraine, Odessa
Odesskii "Memorial" - T.Bulat, Ukraine, Odessa
Odesskoe gorodskoe obshchestvo prav potrebitelei - E.Kulinenko, Ukraine, Odessa
Odessa department of the International Socio Ecological Union - A.Shevchuk, Ukraine; Odessa
Odesskoe otdelenie Soiuza nauchnykh i inzhenernykh obshchestv - Iu.Romanov, Ukraine, Odessa
Skoraia zapovednaia pomoshch' - O.Listopad, Ukraine, Kiev
Ukrainskaia ekologicheskaia organizatsiia "Zelenyi Svit", Odesskoe otdelenie - V.Iankovskii,
Ukraine, Odessa
Ukrainskii nauchnyi tsentr ekologii moria - V.Mikhailov, Ukraine, Odessa
Ukrainskoe obshchestvo okhrany prirody, Odesskoe otdelenie - A.Derboglav, Ukraine, Odessa
Fond "Prirodnoe nasledie" - I.Rusev, Ukraine, Odessa
Chernomorskoe Regional Department of Ukrainian Environmental Academy of Sciences - V.Stepanov,
Ukraine, Odessa
Ekologicheskaia gruppa "Pechenegi" - S.Shaparenko, Ukraine, Khar'kov
Kazakhstan
Paricipants of the 4-th Ekoforum of NGOs of Kazakhstan (50 NGOs) - Kazakhstan, Almaty
EO "Zelenoe spasenie" - S.Solianik, Kazakhstan, Almaaty
Azerbaijan
NGO Karvan (Center for independent social investigations) - Fuad Akhund-zadeb, Azerbaijan, Baku
Turkmenistan
Ecoclub CATENA - T.Berkeliev, Turkmenistan, Ashkhabad
Dashkhovuz ecological club - A.Zatoka, Turkmenistan, Dashkhovuz
Moldova
Respublikanskii detsko-iunosheskii tsentr GUTTA-CLUB - N.Kravchuk, Moldova, Kishinev
For more information:
Alexey Grigoriev, SEU
grig@bcc.seu.ru
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This issue was written and complied by
Sviatoslav Zabelin - the SEU Council Co-Chair, svet@seu.ru
Olga Berlova seupress@seu.ru, translation by Alla Kapustina
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