The Bulletin 5/2: Briefs

A report released on 15 June says it will cost $1.1 billion dollars to repair damage to Lithuania' s environment caused by Soviet troops, Interfax reported. During the study, which was conducted by the Danish company Kruger Consult A/S and the Lithuanian Academy of Sciences, 426 former Soviet military installations covering a total area of 67,000 hectares were inspected. They found heavy pollution from oil and other chemical products. (Source: Saulius Girnius, OMRI, Inc.)

The EBRD has awarded the international environmental consulting firm Arthur D. Little a $380,000 contract to train and certify 200 local environmental consultants from Slovenia, Latvia, and Lithuania, as well as Russia, Ukraine, Kazakhstan, Turkmenia, Belarus, and Kyrgyzstan. Once trained, these consultants will appraise the environmental performance of companies applying for loans, examine local and national environmental laws and regulations, and help the EBRD's financial intermediaries determine environmental risks and liabilities. These consultants will ensure that banks only support environmentally sustainable development.

Green Brigades, a "green" magazine published under the auspices of the Chemists' Scientific Club at the Jagiellonian University in Krakow, offers more than 59 issues in both Polish and English. The magazine currently has a circulation of over 3,000 Polish and 1,500 English issues.
The paper facilitates information exchange between various groups active in the fields of ecology, wildlife conservation, environmental protection, animal rights, vegetarianism, and healthy lifestyles, regardless of any political, religious, philosophical or generational differences. It does not avoid topics like military service, fascism, feminism, human rights, and others which are of interest to people who belong to or sympathize with so-called alternative movements. For more information, contact via e-mail: zielbryg@gn.apc.org.m.

The US Department of Energy and the American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS) are teaming up to provide funding for select scientists from CEE and the former Soviet Union to attend the AAAS annual meeting and to present their research findings at conferences. The award will include return airfare, lodging and per diem. Scientists actively conducting research in the environmental and health effects of radiation conatmination are eligible. Applications must be submitted by 31 October 1995. For more information, please contact Beth Boswell at or (202) 326-6427.

EPA Administrator Carol M. Browner and Polish Minister of Environment Stanislaw Zelichowski signed a Memorandum of Understanding 15 May in Washington, D.C. Under the agreement, the two countries will participate in a wide range of cooperative activities in all areas of environmental protection and remediation. Poland is the EPA's partner in the largest and most complex environmental cooperation program in Central and Eastern Europe. Prior projects have included assistance in building a water treatment facility, assistance with a program to control tanneries pollution and the establishment an air monitoring network.

Bulgaria has begun negotiations with its foreign creditors to swap debts for actions on environmental protection. Poland is the only other European nation to have instigated these "debt-for-nature" exchanges. A trust fund is being set up that will handle money transferred for these schemes, starting with an offer by the Swiss government to reduce Bulgarian debt by between 10 and 20 million Swiss francs. It is envisaged that approved projects will become self-sufficient after the initial funding with no need for additional external financing. (Source: Aegis, April-May)

The European Commission has published a strategy paper promising further support for environmental projects in Eastern Europe in the next five years under its PHARE programme. PHARE has already provided ECU 337 million for several hundred schemes since 1990 but implementation delays on a number of projects has drawn harsh criticism. The EC is now taking steps to streamline its procedures in order to minimize these delays. The PHARE programme focuses on providing technical support to promote environmental legislation; raising public awareness; and encouraging capital investment in environmental projects. (Source: Aegis, April-May)

Bulgaria is awaiting proposals from France's Electricite de France, the United States' Westinghouse Electric Corp. and Germany's Siemens that will detail the modernization of Kozloduy's two 1,000-megawatt reactors. One of the two Soviet-designed reactors has been in operation since 1987 while the other wasn't licensed until 1993. Kozloduy is notorious for a number of accidents that have resulted in fires and leaks. Bulgaria relies on the Kozloduy nuclear power plant for some 40 percent of its energy. (Source: Reuters)

Two of nine journalists recently awarded Knight International Press Fellowships will spend their tours of duty in Central and Eastern Europe, according to a press release from the Center of Foreign Journalists. Richard Mertens, a Ted Scripps Fellow in Environmental Journalism at the University of Michigan, will spend three months in Skopje, Macedonia teaching journalists techniques in reporting and editing. Marvin Stone, chairman and president of the Washington-based International Media Fund, will spend his fellowship in Zagreb, Croatia.

The European Centre for Nature Conservation (ECNC) has set up a WorldWide Web site as part of its information service on the natural environment and sustainability in Europe. This Website supplies relevant information on all aspects of nature conservation in Europe to policy makers, researchers and all other organizations and individuals who are interested in the natural environment and sustainability. Over the next year the server will be gradually expanded into a fully fledged on-line reference site for all those interested in biodiversity and sustainability in Europe. The address is: http://www.ecnc.nl.

THE BULLETIN * SUMMER 1995