today 22.05.2013 10:19
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Human Rights in Ukraine Information website of the Kharkiv Human Rights Protection Group |
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Over the last five years nature reserve land in Ukraine has contracted to a catastrophic degree. Environmentalists say that this is because those in power are appropriating parts of it. 
The environmental situation in the Donetk oblast is by far the worst in Ukraine, and promises from the local authorities that millions will be spent on improvements have been heard before 
Not only have the real numbers of victims of the Chornobyl Disaster never been acknowledged, but the authorities have over the last year demonstrated the same will to conceal the truth and disregard for people’s safety as back in the days and months following 26 April 1986 
Almost 8 months have passed since the murder of well-known Dnipropetrovsk environmentalist Volodymyr Honcharenko and there has been no progress in finding his killers. The dangerous scrap metal load he reported 4 days before his death has vanished, and the promised test results have not eventuated. 
Three laws, including that submitted by the President’s representative in parliament, will, environmentalists warn, lead to a colossal increase “if not in corruption, then in lawlessness” 
With 190 days already this year eliciting warnings about “unfavourable meteorological conditions” and a Metinvest nitrate steel plant in the centre of Mariupol, the residents’ concerns are hardly surprising. 
Civic organizations who have been trying to defend the Bilychansk Forest for several years now are calling on media managers to stop putting pressure on journalists and censoring the issue 
On Sunday thousands of residents of Mariupol (Donetsk oblast) took part in a demonstration against the environmental situation in the city. They were protesting over the constant smog and stench from factories which hits you as soon as you go outside. 
Exactly 2 months have passed since Volodymyr Honcharenko, a prominent environmentalist from Dnipropetrovsk, was fatally injured in a brutal attack. . 
As reported, the law recently adopted, allows the construction of two new nuclear reactors at the Khmelnytski Nuclear Power Plant despite the fact that consultation with neighbouring countries had not ended 
Ukraine’s leaders’ faith in the power of committees is misguided. If they are still offered as a panacea for all Ukraine’s democratic aches and pains, then presumably those in the frontline of criticism have no other ammunition. Or hope they can make it to cover before being exposed. 
They are calling on President Yanukovych to veto a law passed in breach of Ukrainian legislation and its international commitments under the Espoo Convention 
The authorities have not only failed to investigate the hazardous chemical contamination which civic activist Volodymyr Honcharenko warned about 4 days before he was murdered, but have misled the Aarhus Convention Compliance Committee leaving Ukrainian NGOs with no choice but to set the record straight 
It is terrifying – and unacceptable – to think that in today’s Ukraine those who expose inconvenient information of public importance can be killed. Please endorse the following appeal 
The authorities have virtually not responded at all to the murder of the well-known Dnipropetrovsk environmentalist and civic activist Volodymyr Honcharenko. There were no words of sympathy, no promises to investigate the crime, bring those responsible to justice. 
Disturbingly little is heard about Volodymyr Honcharenko’s murder and there are worrying signs that for whatever reasons not all those in authority appear to want the truth to come out and those responsible to be held to answer. 
Front Line Defenders strongly condemns the killing of Volodymyr Honcharenko and believes that it is directly linked to his legitimate activities as an environmental rights defender, particularly in light of reports from his colleagues that he had been threatened before. 
The website is created with assistance of the International Renaissance Foundation and National Endowment for Democracy (USA)
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