Paul
Goble
Staunton, August 7 – Yesterday, some
300 residents of Novosibirsk took part in a meeting in reaction to recent
statements by officials there that it isn’t worthwhile to fight the forest
fires raging in the area but preferable to allow the conflagration to burn out
on its own (sobkorr.org/news/5D4AB6EAA478D.html).
The meeting was organized by Sergey
Boyko, an opposition candidate for mayor of that city. He told the crowd that
officials had suggested he cancel the demonstration because the smoke that had
enveloped Novosibirsk has eased in recent days. But he said that he hadn’t
because despite official claims to the contrary the area engulfed in flames has
only grown.
Boyko said that officials have tried
to ignore or minimize the extent of the problem, with the federal media
treating it as some minor matter. “For Moscow bureaucrats, Siberia burning is
hardly a significant event. How can this be news worthy of federal treatment?
Let the fires burn and then there will be fewer protest meetings.”
Other speakers said that the harm
from this year’s fires will take “no less than 100 years” to recover from; and
they demanded not only that greater efforts be expended to control and
extinguish the fires but that those officials responsible for this “ecological
catastrophe” be identified and punished.
Participants shouted “We demand an
end to the killing of the natural wealth of Siberia!” “Is it really
unreasonable to put out forest fires but entirely so to build a residence for
Patriarch Kirill for 2.8 billion rubles” (40 million US dollars). And most
seriously, they declared that “We Can’t Change the Climate but We Must Change
Our Political Leaders.”
The meeting adopted a resolution
demanding that all available forces of the emergency services ministry and the
Russian Guard be used to fight the fires and agreed to send it to Sergey
Menyaylo, the president’s plenipotentiary for Siberia. The meeting ended
without any arrests or disorders.
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