By Country / Russia
Russian Ecologists Form Green Russia Party
June 06, 2005
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6 June 2005 -- Some of Russia's leading ecologists marked World Environment Day by joining to launch the Union of Greens party.
Aleksei Yablokov, a respected nuclear safety campaigner and an adviser in the 1990s to then-president Boris Yeltsin, was elected president at the meeting in Korolyov, outside Moscow.
Yablokov, who has also campaigned for human rights in Russia, said there were hopes the Greens could unite other Russian ecological organizations and become a significant minority in the lower house of parliament, the State Duma, in the 2007 elections.
Chosen as one of Yablokov's deputies was Aleksandr Nikitin, a former Soviet naval captain who was accused of treason in 1996 after preparing a report on safety problems in Russia's nuclear fleet.
Russia's Supreme Court cleared Nikitin of all charges in 2000.
(AFP/AP)