While the nation was preoccupied with the parliamentary election campaign for 90 days, civil society activists have been struggling to protect the capital’s forests.
On election
night – from Oct. 28 to Oct. 29 – a group of unidentified people cut down a
huge swatch of forestland in Bykivnia, northeast of Kyiv.
“Developers
barbarically cut 100-year-old pines on 4 hectares [and] erected a construction
fence [there],” said Vitaliy Cherniahivsky, coordinator of the Forum for Saving
Kyiv civic campaign.
And in the thick
of the election campaign on Oct. 9, a court ruling put under
threat another forest, Bilychansky,located northwest of Kyiv. The court’s ruling
transferred ownership of 4,000 hectares of forestland there from Kyiv to the
town of Kotsiubynske. Activists fear more trees will be chopped down in the
forest after that.
“Kyiv is
being quietly robbed during election campaign,” said Veronika Aheyeva, head of the
public committee for saving Bilychansky forest. “But we are not going to lose
our heart.”
While it is
too late to save felled trees in Bykivnia forest, activists in Kyiv have once
again stood up to save the Bilychansky forest from potential developers.
Two dozen
Kyivans rallied near the Kyiv City Council on Nov.1 and chanted, “Protect
Bilychansky forest!” Their unfolded banners urged authorities to save the
forest by designating as a national park.
Located in
Kyiv’s Sviatoshyn district, Bilychansky Forest has since 1956 been used by a Kyiv
utility company. Inside this forest there is a small town that occupies 87
hectares, Kotsiubynske, which belongs to Kyiv Oblast.
Though the
boundaries between Kyiv and Kotsiubynske are not clearly set, Kotsiubynske authorities
with a help of Kyiv Oblast officials changed the status of 4,000 hectares of
forestland and began transferring it into private hands around 2008, activists
say.
Between 2008
and 2010 Kotsiubynske authorities transferred more than 700 hectares of forestland
to communal and private ownership.
In 2011,
President Viktor Yanukovych promised journalists that no tree in this forest would
be cut. Despite this, activists say, more than 10 hectares of forest have been illegally
cut, including 40-year old oaks.
Law suits,
police investigations and public protests have accompanied the Bilychansky
forest affair. Several activists have been threatened, including activist journalist
Iryna Fedoriv who received a threatening phone call one night from an unknown
man who demanded that she stop covering this topic.
A few weeks
before the Oct. 28 parliamentary vote, the High Administrative Court of Ukraine
cancelled a lower court decision that would’ve given activists victory. In its
Oct. 9 ruling, the court sanctioned the expansion of Kotsiubynske’s town limits
to include the 4,000 hectares of Bilychansky forest. Thus Kyiv lost control
over the prized forestland.
“Never has
Kyiv lost such a big territory of forest, such a big recreational zone,” said
Andriy Skipalsky, head of the non-governmental organization Zhyttia (life).
On Nov. 1, the
Kyiv City Council voted to officially request that the president, the
parliamentary speaker and general prosecutor prevent Kyiv’s territorial integrity
from being touched.
Earlier this summer, Kyiv City Council members voted also
to save the Bilychansky forest by designating it a national park. Activists
collected 14,000 signatures to support this move and sent a relevant request to
Viktor Yanukovych. The Presidential Administration subsequently forwarded
the measure to the Cabinet of Ministers.
Kyiv Post staff writer
Oksana Faryna can be reached at [email protected].
