Armenia’s Greens Demand Punishment of Officials

ARMENIA’s GREENS DEMAND PUNISHMENT OF OFFICIALS

YEREVAN, JULY 24. ARMINFO. A number of Armenian environmental
organizations demand that the current and former mayors of Yerevan,
former chief architect, as well as Government officials, who
contributed to mass destruction of green zones in Yerevan, be held
responsible.

At his press conference, the representative of the Social Ecological
Party of Armenia Armen Dovlatyan stated that environmental
organizations demand that the RA Government and Yerevan Municipality
put an end to all illegal and “Legal’ allotments of lands for
construction in Yerevan’s green zones. They also demand the
restoration of the greenery destroyed as a result of construction.
According to Dovlatyan, the forests in Nork are deliberately being
destroyed for the purpose of further construction there. He said that
some of the forests are no longer under the jurisdiction of the
“ArmForest” CJSC, as construction is not allowed in territories under
the jurisdiction of the “ArmForest” CJSC. Dovlatyan stated that over
1,500 of 2,000 hectares of Yerevan’s green zones have been
destroyed. He stressed that over 1,000 hectares were destroyed in
1995-2003. “If the destruction of Yerevan’s green zones continues, the
capital will turn from semi-desert into a desert, which will affect
the population’s health,” he said.