EcoWatch activists and Dozhd journalist released after detention near Gelendzhik

Two activists of the "Ecological Watch for North Caucasus" (EcoWatch) and a journalist of the "Dozhd" (Rain) TV Channel "Rain" were taken to the police station after being kept for five hours by employees of a private security company near the city of Gelendzhik. The activists were released after giving their explanatory notes, the "EcoWatch" activists report.

The "Caucasian Knot" has reported that Dmitry Shevchenko and Victor Chirikov, activists of the "Ecological Watch for Northern Caucasus" (EcoWatch), and Sergey Petrov, a correspondent of the "Dozhd" (Rain) TV Channel, were detained today in the vicinity of the village of Kabardinka by employees of the private security company.

According to Victor Chirikov, on December 2 "activists were holding a public inspection near the village of Kabardinka near Gelendzhik, in the territory of the State Forest Fund." The activists believe that these land plots "were captured by Evgeny Prigozhin, a member of the Putin's closest retinue."

Mr Chirikov asserts that during the inspection the "EcoWatch" activists found out that "a road has been built and a transmission line lain; and a part of the territory of the above State Forest Fund has been fenced off."

"After we entered the territory, some guards, armed with submachine guns, drove up to us," Victor Chirikov told the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent.

"They kept us for five hours; then police came, but the boss of the Kabardinka village police division was not let into the guarded area," said Chirikov, adding that the guards "intimidated the ecologists."

"We were brought to the outer post and then taken to village police station," said Chirikov.

Dmitri Shevchenko, Deputy Coordinator of the "EcoWatch", told the "Caucasian Knot" correspondent that the ecologists "had the right to stay in the territory of the State Forest Fund."

According to Mr Shevchenko, the activists are sure that "there was a capture of the forest land, since the site is fenced off with a capital fence; and residential houses are being built there."

Full text of the article is available on the Russian page of 24/7 Internet agency ‘Caucasian Knot’.