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7 October 2020.
Introduction:
An ‘ecological disaster’ of sorts is unfolding on a black volcanic beach of the Kamchatka Peninsula in the Russian Far East.
Highlights:
- A special envoy under Russian President Vadimir Putin was deployed for an immediate inquiry.
- The team found that the levels of phenols and oil compounds in the sea had increased that led to the ecological catastrophe.
- It is also feared that rocket fuel stored in the military testing grounds may have leaked.
- The pollution came to light after water colour began to change in the region.
- The region is a popular destination for adventure tourism for its abundance of wildlife and live volcanoes.
- The Kamchatka is a UNESCO World Heritage site.
Criteria to select the UNESCO World Heritage Site:
- The site should contain most important natural habitat of biological diversity.
- It should contain threatened species of Universal value in the point of conservation.
- It should be an outstanding example of ongoing biological and ecological processes.
- It should bring out the evolution and development of freshwater and Terrestrial coastal and marine ecosystems and communities of animals and plants.
- The site should be of outstanding examples to represent the history of the earth. It should have ongoing logical processes that develop landforms, geomorphic and physiographic features.
- It should contain natural phenomenon of a static importance and natural beauty.
- This site should be associated with events that project Universal significance.
- It should be an example of traditional land use, sea use human settlement for human interaction with environment and has become vulnerable due to the impacts of Irreversible changes.
- It should be an outstanding example of architectural landscape that illustrates human history in significant stages.
- It should hold testimonies of Cultural Tradition.
- It should exhibit developments in monumental Arts town planning and landscape design.
- It should be a Masterpiece of human creativeness.