Collateral victims of the conflict in Ukraine. This Wednesday on his social networks, Volodymyr Zelensky denounced “ecocide” after the cataloged death of thousands of dolphins in the Black Sea, directly linked according to him to the effects of the Russian invasion in Ukraine on the marine environment.
“Thousands of dead dolphins have washed up on the shores of the Black Sea,” the Ukrainian president said in a message on social media, relaying a report released by United24, an online crowdfunding platform he launched in early May. “The Russian war has a huge impact on the fauna of our country,” he lashed out, lamenting its “devastating consequences” on ecosystems.
50,000 dead dolphins?
The Ukrainian president stated that the authorities responsible for environmental protection “collect the evidence of these crimes and intend to hold Russia responsible for this ecocide in Ukraine.”
According to the scientific director of the Lagunes de Touzly National Park (south-west), interviewed for this report, the slaughter of dolphins in the Black Sea is due in particular to “the presence of submarines and warships” in the waters since the end of February, which “has put enormous pressure on the marine environment”.
“We estimate that 50,000 dolphins died because of the war,” Ivan Roussev said, of which 2,500 “were found (on the beaches) in the Odessa region, in the annexed Crimea, but also in Bulgaria, Turkey and Romania.”
This represents 20% of the population of this cetacean in the Black Sea, registered at 250,000 in 2020 and which was already subject to fishing pressure and pollution, according to the Ukrainian authorities.
According to him, who runs a popular Facebook journal about the effects of the war on wildlife, some bird species were also forced to “migrate” at the beginning of the year, driven by the consequences of “missiles that fell on the top of the east of the national park. “.
Source: BFM TV
