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| 28.02.2011 14:04

Quit scandalous project immediately

VINCI
Headquarters
1, cours Ferdinand de Lesseps
F-92851 Rueil-Malmaison Cedex

France

Tel. : (+33) 1 47 16 35 00
Fax : (+33) 1 47 51 91 02
 

OPEN LETTER TO VINCI GROUP



Dear Mr. Huillard,

Russian and foreign environmentalists and human right defenders have repeatedly warned  you about ecological danger and technical inconsistencies  of the project of Moscow – St. Petersburg toll motorway through  Khimki Forest. This project unites in itself all vices which prevent Russia from developing into a modern democratic country.

- Corruption – even President Medvedev had to acknowledge that the chosen “route wasn’t the best way, and state interests were sacrificed to commercial interests of definite persons” (http://news.rambler.ru/8912432/).

- Lack of competence – according to the report of independent expert commission, the chosen project of the motorway would inevitably worsen already existing transport crisis in northern Moscow because city’s infrastructure is incapable to receive traffic from the new road (http://www.greenpeace.org/russia/ru/news/03-02-2011-Khimki/). Rapid toll motorway across woodlands is ineffective for passing local traffic which prevails on this section.

- Neglecting principles of sustainable development – more than 1000 hectares of Khimki Forest would suffer unrecoverable damage due to clearing, fragmentation, and further degradation of ecosystem under influence of the motorway. This loss has no justification because there are alternative ways to solve transport problem without any serious damage to the environment. Among such ways we can mention development of public electrical transport as well as building of a supplementary road in parallel to existing M10 motorway using the strips of land along  power transmission lines. Such decision doesn’t need any demolition of houses which has been a traditional threat for Khimki residents from Russian Ministry of Transport officials and other lobbyists of the route across the woodland (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w0oARO9qYeU&feature=player_embedded).

-Lawlessness –Independent expert commission found out a lot of breaches of law committed due to this project. Russian legislation forbids use of forest lands for capital construction if there are alternative options to build an object. For the road section after Khimki, where the motorway also crosses forest lands, there have been made no attempts at all to find any alternatives lowering damage to environment. The Supreme Court of Russia turned blind eye to environmentalists’ arguments in the same way as it did in cases of  Khodorkovsky and Sutyagin. The court’s decision was sharply criticized by human right watchdogs  such as Moscow Helsinki group, Movement for Human Rights, etc.

- Suppression of civil society – You ought to know that attempts of road construction across Khimki Forest in the last year summer have raised a wave of protests. Unlawful arrests and beating of activists, recent attempt to fabricate  criminal charges against forest defenders  Alla Chernyshova and Mikhail Matveev  will undoubtedly continue in the same way in the nearest future. Extremly outrageous are attempts to use threats to deprive parents from their children as a mean of pressure, as we can see in the case of Evgenia Chirikova. Sergey Kelbach from state corporation Avtodor already threats to use ‘severe punishment’ against those brave people who will stay on the way of this project. It seems that repressions are the sole remaining argument of project’s supporters in their dispute with the civil society.

Unfortunately, Monsieur Huillard, your company still participates in the activity of the Northwestern Concession Company (NWCC) which has won the official tender on motorway construction under strange circumstances. This fact urges you and your company to ignore all things that have become clear for more than 2/3 of Russia’s population (this is the majority decisively disapproving the felling of the forest for motorway’s construction according to public opinion polls). You haven’t been impressed even by decision of leading European banks not to take part in the financing of this affair, because 100 % of financial coverage of the project is now laid upon Russian federal budget and ‘pocket’ state-controlled Russian banks. And Russian government takes upon itself all risks of your company (arousing from extreme incompetence of the project) – at the expense of Russian taxpayers, of course.

Everything has its price – and together with you Mr. Arkady Rotenberg, one of closest friends of Prime Minister Putin, becomes a participant of the project and a shareholder in NWCC. There is no doubt that together with him your company has far better chances of uncontrollable and unpunished capture of woodlands privatized by Putin’s government (for a “honest” price of EUR 100 per hectare) as well as of Russian taxpayers’ money. Probably it’s enough for you to forget those fine words about environmental responsibility and sustainable development written in the Vinci’s web site. At least, they are forgotten, when company’s activity in Russia is concerned. The known lobbyist possibilities of your company let it initiate addresses of top officials of France to their Russian colleagues with requests to resume immediately the project –   so profitable for your company. In fact, these are the requests to suppress more effectively the civil society in Russia and to destroy more quickly our common environment (http://www.lemonde.fr/idees/article/2010/10/06/destruction-de-la-foret-russe-a-quoi-jouent-les-francais_1421251_3232.html).

We would be glad to believe that you have been misled by Russian officials’ declarations about ‘efficiency’ of compensation measures which they have worked out. In this case we recommend you to study the results of independent environmental examination of this project (http://www.greenpeace.org/russia/Global/russia/report/forest/Khimki/Khim_Concl-v2.pdf). And if you don’t believe Russian experts,  ask, please,  French Greens or WWF of France about consequences of fragmentation of forest areas surrounded by densely populated territories. Or about efficiency and rationality of replanting 150-year-old oaks.

If your company tries to use the pitiful state of the modern Russia to practice here a neocolonial policy of collaboration with corrupt ‘elite’ at the expense of ordinary people and living nature, we should remember that Russia has known even worse times. But our country has always restored its strength, and strong Russia has been many times a valuable friend and ally for France. Traditional sympathy for France in Russian society played an important role in formation of friendship and alliance between the two countries. For Russians, France has always been a symbol of enlightenment and struggle for freedom. It wasn’t by chance that knowledge of French was for a long time an obligatory attribute of an educated Russian, and Marseillaise served in fact as a hymn of Russian fighters with despotism.


Today we begin to see with bewilderment that France turns for us from the symbol of freedom and progress into the symbol of triumph of mercenary interests, corruption and collaboration over public interests, nature and civil society. And we decisively request you, for the sake of the good name of your company, as well as of the good name of your nation, which Vinci represents here - to leave unconditionally and immediately the scandalous project. The current moment when Russian customer of the project, state corporation Avtodor, intends to renew concession agreement suits well for such a step. Later, since March, a ‘hot’ phase of confrontation will begin - with new wave of repression and lawlessness. Both your company and your country will be fully responsible for such development in the eyes of the whole world – even if your Russian ‘partners’ promise you to do all the “dirty work” by themselves.

Movement to Defend Khimki Forest (Ecooborona)
www.ecmo.ru