UNESCO again refused to include Kamchatka volcanoes on the list of endangered sites

UNESCO for the second time changed its mind about assigning the status of “endangered” to the volcanoes of Kamchatka. For the third year now, the organization has been concerned about plans to build a “volcanic” ski resort. However, yesterday Russia promised the World Heritage Committee to create a national park in Kamchatka that would protect the nature of the region. True, “resort” areas will not be included there, so UNESCO proposed giving them protected status. The Russian side promised to “do everything to preserve the natural diversity of the territory.”

The 45th session of the UNESCO World Heritage Committee is taking place in Riyadh from 10 to 25 September. As Kommersant said, on the eve of this event the organization “again expressed its extreme concern” about the situation around the natural site “Volcanoes of Kamchatka.” Moreover, the draft decisions of the committee recommended that volcanoes be given the status of World Heritage Sites that are under serious and specific danger.

In July 2021, UNESCO already expressed concern about plans to create a “Three Volcanoes” tourism cluster. The Interros group of Vladimir Potanin announced its intentions to build a resort with hotels and ski slopes, as well as eco-camps and a geopark near the Mutnovsky, Vilyuchinsky and Gorely volcanoes (the planned completion date is 2027, the announced cost is 39.2 billion rubles). To avoid UNESCO claims, the Governor of the Kamchatka Territory Vladimir Solodov decided to change the boundaries of the South Kamchatsky Natural Park. Parts of the territory of the Vilyuchinsky volcano, Vilyuchinskaya and Zhirovaya bays were excluded from the composition of the specially protected natural territory (SPNA) of regional significance.

At that time, volcanoes were not included in the list of endangered objects, but this turned out to be only a delay. In 2023, UNESCO complained that “the boundaries of the South Kamchatka Natural Park were changed at the national level” and again proposed assigning “threatening” status to the volcanoes. As Mikhail Kreindlin, a member of the Expert Council on Nature Reserves, explained to Kommersant, this is fraught with exclusively “image losses” for the country.

On Wednesday, at a meeting of the World Heritage Committee, representatives of Ethiopia proposed not to make such a decision and to listen to the arguments of the Russian side. After this, Russian representatives announced that, on the instructions of the president, they were actively working on the creation of a national park with the tentative name “Volcanoes of Kamchatka.”

Indeed, on September 5, the draft regulations on the creation of such a national park were published for public discussion. However, the boundaries of this protected area do not include the very areas whose exclusion caused UNESCO concern. Representatives of Belgium pointed this out, and representatives of Russia promised to locate these territories in the security zone of the national park. They also assured that there is no construction going on there right now.

Members of the committee nevertheless proposed to revise the boundaries of the planned protected area and include disputed areas in them. To this, Russian representatives vaguely promised to “do everything to preserve the natural diversity of the territory.” As a result, the committee was satisfied with these arguments and did not add “Volcanoes of Kamchatka” to the list of endangered objects.

Mikhail Kreindlin, who was present at the session, told Kommersant that softness towards Russia was not a unique situation. According to him, all the planned tough decisions of the committee “weakened” after their discussion: “Now there are many countries in the Committee from Asia and Africa, which, as a rule, have many problems with their World Heritage sites. “I believe that they deliberately tried to make the most lenient decisions so as not to incur the wrath of other countries next time.” Let us remind you that the composition of the World Heritage Committee is regularly rotated; currently its members are Argentina, Belgium, Bulgaria, Egypt, Ethiopia, Greece, India, Italy, Japan, Mali, Mexico, Nigeria, Oman, Qatar, Russian Federation, Rwanda, Saint Vincent and Grenadines, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Thailand and Zambia.

The Ministry of Natural Resources assured Kommersant that the decision to create a new national park has nothing to do with UNESCO’s claims. “It was adopted after the Eastern Economic Forum 2022,” the press service noted. The Ministry did not answer the question whether the boundaries of protected areas will be changed in accordance with UNESCO recommendations. However, the department repeated the position of the Russian delegation that “the territory not included within the boundaries of the national park will be located in its protective zone.”

A source close to the Ministry of Natural Resources noted in a conversation with Kommersant that the decision of the UNESCO World Heritage Committee once again proves the “baselessness of some politicians’ proposals” to withdraw from the UNESCO World Heritage Convention. And he considered it important to note that Russia’s participation in such agreements “opens up great opportunities for preserving the environment and culture, which should be above political games.” Let us recall that on September 7, State Duma Deputy Speaker Pyotr Tolstoy (United Russia) called for consideration of the issue of Russia’s withdrawal from UNESCO. He expressed dissatisfaction with the position of the organization, which was concerned about the bill allowing clear logging for the purpose of tourist development of Lake Baikal.

Official documents of the committee will be published after the end of the session. Nevertheless, the relevant Deputy Chairman of the Russian Government, Victoria Abramchenko, has already announced the successful results of the 45th session. “Russia has demonstrated to the world community the priority of environmental protection measures and environmental policy aimed at preserving unique natural complexes. We note the balanced, non-politicized approach of the experts,” said the Deputy Prime Minister.

Polina Yachmennikova