Oleg Mitvol, deputy director at the Federal Environmental Monitoring Service of Russia (Rosprirodnadzor)
Photo: Pavel Smertin
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Inspectors Unable to Cover the Whole List of Mitvol
Buryatia’s and Irkut region’s branch of the Federal Environmental Monitoring Service of Russia (Rosprirodnadzor) reported yesterday, October 6, 2005, they have completed the check of the buildings erected on the beach of Lake Baikal. The highlight was legality of construction. Deputy director of Rosprirodnadzor, Oleg Mitvol claimed in early September more than 500 premises are subject to probe. Mitvol vowed to shed light on the reasons of their construction in the near-shore and water conservation area of Baikal within a month.
The nature monitoring officers focused on Baikal once their commission was back from the tour to the area. Having ignored Baikal pulp and paper enterprise that is traditionally condemned for pollution, or Transneft, which is resolute to construct a pipeline at the distance of 800 meters from Baikal, Mitvol pointed to the holiday centers and small hotels constructed ashore and having “obscure sewerage.” “The damage caused to Baikal by the household waste has long surpassed the damage of the pulp and paper enterprise,” Mitvol said ordering to inspect suspicious buildings within a month so that the prosecutors could have the results early December.
Buryatia’s and Irkut region’s officials of Rosprirodnadzor confirmed they finalized the inspection early October and certain violations had been spotted. The documents “have been just forwarded to Moscow,” the officials specified declining to elaborate, as they are accountable only to Mitvol, not to reporters, they said.
But it appears that of the long list of Mitvol, the inspectors were able to check only eight buildings. They failed to cover more than 100 small hotels/holidays centers set for inspection in Buryatia’s shore of Baikal, Kommersant was told off-the-record, due to the general lack of manpower.
www.kommersant.com
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