Russian Regulator Raises Caspian Environmental Issues at OSCE Forum

Excerpt from report by Russian news agency ITAR-TASS

Moscow, 22 May: Deputy head of Rosprirodnadzor [Russian Federal Service for Regulation of the Use of Natural Resources], Oleg Mitvol, has said that activities of translational corporations on the Caspian shelf is the main reason for [mass] deaths of seals. Quoting Russian scientists, Mitvol said this at the second session of the OSCE Economic and Environmental Forum in Prague today.

Speaking at a special event devoted to the problems of the Caspian Sea, Mitvol recalled that in spring 2007 many dead seals were found on the Kazakh coast and that by May their number exceeded 1,000. Kazakh counterparts supported Mitvol’s proposal to organize an inspection of activities of transnational corporations on the Caspian shelf on the republic’s [Kazakhstan's] territory. The OSCE will discuss the issue of conducting the inspection separately.

In addition, Mitvol proposed to ban the use of single-hull oil bunkers [as received, probably tankers] in the Caspian Sea. “Single- hull bunkers [tankers] have been long banned in the Mediterranean and Baltic seas where they use safer, double-hull and triple-hull ones,” he stressed. The OSCE Secretariat will examine this issue as well. [Passage omitted: background on the forum]

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