Environment matters

 
Landfill sites in Russia are actually bigger than some countries, and authorities are calling for more recycling and tougher action against pollution. With more than 2,000 square km of rubbish and solid waste rotting across Russia, the total area is six times the size of Malta.
 

Mikhail Gorbachev's article on ratifying the nuclear test ban treaty can be found here.

The Moscow News has reported that levels of radiation on Moscow’s streets have reached a level so high that the authorities are about to spend 4.7 billion roubles ($153 million) to get rid of it. The clean-up will run from 2011-2013 amid reports of no fewer than 18 dangerous radioactive objects within the capital, some of which can be found in heavily built-up areas like Kuzminki, or on slopes vulnerable to landslips close to the Moskva river.
 

 
President Medvedev made the following announcement on his blog yesterday evening!
 

In a highly disturbing - and suspicious - development, the battle to stop a highway being built through Khimki Forest turned violent on Wednesday as crowds of youths wearing bandanas and ski masks attacked the Moscow suburb’s town hall with Molotov cocktails.
Police responded quickly by detaining 16 environmental activists camped out in the forest who claimed to be unconnected to the attack.

The Khimki forest is located just 5km to the North of Moscow, and is a part of Russia’s equivalent of “Green Belt”, intended to protect the forest. A new motorway is to be built through the forest, connecting Moscow and St Petersburg, dividing the forest with is valuable eco-system in half.

According to Russian news service RIA Novosti, polar bear hunting, with an annual quota of 29 bears per year, could begin on Russia's Chukchi Peninsula in 2011.
 
The annual quota was set in early June at a Russian-U.S. Polar Bear Commission meeting in Anchorage, Alaska.
 
"The beginning of the hunt depends on how fast the bureaucratic work is completed. It may begin in the second half of 2011 or even 2012," biodiversity program coordinator at WWF-Russia Vladimir Krever said.
 

//

On March 24th Greenpeace activists demonstrated outside the French embassies in Moscow and St Petersburg. They were protesting about the import of nuclear waste into Russia. Having chained themselves to barrels depicting radioactive symbols, the activists were eventually taken into custody and were each fined 500 roubles.
 

 
 
 Centre Telecom, Federal Grid Company of Unified Energy System, Gazprom, Irkutskenergo, Novatek and Tatneft were the Russian corporations leading efforts to understand and tackle climate change, according to this year’s inaugural Carbon Disclosure Project (CDP) Russia 50 report. The report which details the greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions and climate change strategies of Russia’s largest companies was supported by the British Embassy and launched on Wednesday in Moscow.