Environmentalists send report to the UN on eco-disaster in Crimea caused by Russians

The United Nations handed over a detailed report on environmental and legal violations in occupied Crimea. In particular, the report referred to the damage to biodiversity and the restriction of the rights of Crimean Tatars.

This was reported by the press service of the Crimean Tatar Resource Center.

The Crimean Tatar Resource Center (CTRC) has submitted an analytical report to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights on the consequences of the Russian occupation of Crimea for the environment and the rights of indigenous people. The document will become part of a global study within the framework of the Kunming-Montreal Framework Program, which is being implemented under the Convention on Biological Diversity.

In the report, experts documented systemic violations of the rights of Crimean Tatars, including the right to self-government, participation in decision-making and access to natural resources.

The CTRC emphasized that over the years of occupation, the peninsula has suffered large-scale environmental damage: due to militarization, barbaric use of resources, massive construction and training of the Russian army. This has led to the loss of biodiversity, destruction of unique landscapes and restricted access to lands where Crimean Tatars have traditionally been engaged in farming, collecting medicinal plants and other types of economy.

In its appeal to the international community, the CTRC called for

• strengthen monitoring of the environmental situation and human rights in the occupied Crimea;
• support public initiatives to document crimes;
• to involve representatives of indigenous peoples in the development of environmental policy;
• integrate traditional knowledge of Crimean Tatars into nature protection programs;
• provide technical and financial support for the implementation of the Global Biodiversity Strategy until 2035.

The press service noted that this report is another evidence that the occupation of Crimea not only violates human rights but also causes irreparable damage to the environment.

Fresh water reserves in the temporarily occupied Crimea continue to decline - in May 2025 alone, reservoirs lost about 11 million cubic meters of water. Currently, their volume is 126 million cubic meters, which is approximately 50% of the maximum capacity, while last year this figure was about 75%. This situation, in the absence of long-term solutions, could lead to a new wave of environmental and humanitarian crisis on the occupied peninsula.

Анна Літман