Google News Ukraine accuses Russia of ecocide for massive death of dolphins in the Black Sea
by LORENZO CIOTTI | VIEW 904
Dolphins and porpoises are dying by the hundreds in the Black Sea, according to Ukrainian authorities due to the war unleashed by Russia. As reported by the New York Times, Ukrainian authorities are documenting the unfolding eco-environmental disaster in order to prosecute Russia for the environmental damage caused by the war, accusing the country led by Vladimir Putin of ecocide.
There are no precise figures on the number of dead animals: Ruslan Strilets, the Ukrainian minister of environmental protection and natural resources, said in an interview that environmental investigators have collected data on more than 900 cases of dead dolphins, a figure that it includes those found lifeless on the coasts of Ukraine, Turkey and Bulgaria, which also border the Black Sea, but to which the porpoises must be added in any case.
Pawel Goldin, PhD in zoology and specializing in marine mammal populations at the Ukrainian Scientific Center of Marine Ecology, points out that explosions, rocket launches and low-flying Russian fighter jets can cause trauma in dolphins.
Sea mines littering coastal waters are new deadly obstacles.
Ukraine accuses Russia of ecocide for massive dolphins death
The New York Times said that autopsies are performed on the animals and, after each one, Ukraine sends the samples to experts at the University of Padua in Italy and the University of Hanover in Germany for further analysis.
Maksym Popov, adviser to the Prosecutor General of Ukraine, explained: "Right now we are developing the strategy for prosecution of environmental war crimes and ecocide. The environment is often referred to as the silent victim of war.
Ukraine is trying to change this situation, because the environment has no citizenship, no borders." New York Times explains that at the moment there are four points recognized as international crimes, namely genocide, crimes against humanity, aggression and war crimes, but that Ukraine would like to add a fifth, namely ecocide, and to prepare in this sense is also conducting autopsies on animals that appear ashore.
