Dvorichanskyi Park between poachers and officials
Materials helping to understand the conflict between the administration of Dvorichanskyi National Nature Park and poachers/officials. My colleagues and I support park director Maksym Vysochyn.
On April 8, 2015, a press conference on the Dvorichanskyi Park issue was held at the Kharkiv Crisis Info Center. Participants included not only the planned speakers (right to left: Oleh Viatkin from the NGO “Pechenihy,” Maksym Vysochyn — acting director of NNP “Dvorichanskyi,” Tetiana Atemasova — associate professor at V.N. Karazin KhNU, and a representative of the 15th reserve battalion of DUK “Right Sector”), but also Andrii Tymchuk, director of the Kharkiv Regional State Administration ecology department. [IMG_1] A video recording of the press conference is available via the link below (photo is clickable). In the photo, Mr. Tymchuk’s speech evokes very moderate enthusiasm from Tetiana Andriivna. [IMG_2] If interested, I (DSh) join the discussion near the end, at this link. For readers who will not dive deeply into the issue history, several facts are worth noting. Dvorichanskyi National Nature Park is the smallest national park in Ukraine, located on the border with Russia. Its unique feature is chalk outcrops along the Oskil banks and unusual ecosystems associated with them. The initiators and authors of the Park project were staff of the Faculty of Biology of Kharkiv University (including Tetiana Atemasova). The Park was established by Presidential decree in 2009 and began real work in 2012. From then until now, its director has been Maksym Olehovych Vysochyn. [IMG_3] By the efforts of Park staff, this conservation institution was created essentially from scratch. Unfortunately, a presidential decree alone is insufficient for formal land allocation to the Park. The Park administration still cannot resolve this due to sabotage by local authorities and lack of support... [IMG_4] [IMG_5] [IMG_6] [IMG_7] [IMG_8] Let us see what happens. [IMG_9] What can readers of this page do? Minimum program: send a support letter for Maksym Vysochyn to representative of the conservation organization “Pechenihy” at krivohigaya_marina@email.ua (sample text is here; signature collection deadline is end of day April 10). Another option — as indicated on the linked page — write your position to the head of Kharkiv administration Ihor Raianin (obladm@kharkivoda.gov.ua, golova@kharkivoda.gov.ua). Maximum program is individual. In general, it seems necessary to ensure resonance so strong that it becomes impossible to hush this up, remove Vysochyn, and allow poachers to do whatever they want. Will you help?