Russia and Its Neighbors - Comparing Environmental Policies in 16 Countries - page 225

the Antarctic treaty. It intended to participate in the first Earth Summit in
Stockholm, but at the last minute withdrew in protest when East Germany
was excluded. In fact, the USSR had an unofficial delegation present, and
the director of the conference briefed them almost daily. The Soviets
were members of the International Whaling Commission, though they
opposed moratorium proposals. In 1976 the USSR proposed a series of
Europe-wide conferences emphasizing the dangers of nuclear weapons to
the environment. They participated in the UN Environmental Program.
In participating in multilateral groups, the Soviet Union tended to bend
them to fit its political foreign policy aims.
As part of detente, in 1972 the United States and the Soviet Union
signed a treaty on environmental cooperation. American experts vis-
ited the USSR, and Soviet experts visited the United States. For instance,
a US group went to Lake Baikal. US EPA later expanded on these visits
and added conferences. These bilateral efforts were much less subverted
toward foreign policy aims than was the case with multilateral efforts.
Cooperation inched forward until 1980 when President Jimmy Carter
downgraded relations with the Soviets to punish them for invading
Afghanistan. Ronald Reagan began his presidency hostile to the USSR,
but moderated his stance within a few years, and at a summit meeting in
Geneva in 1985, he and Gorbachev agreed to negotiate a treaty on envi-
ronmental cooperation. Over the next 5 years, with reforms and then with
the dissolution of the USSR, the situation became more like normal rela-
tions between two countries.
When Russia became independent of the USSR, it revised its environ-
mental laws and agencies. Its 1993 constitution declared that the land and
natural resources were to be protected, and that citizens were entitled to
information about environmental dangers. The new parliament passed
laws to safeguard the land, forests, wildlife, water, and the environment
in general. Several interest groups soon came into operation: the Center
for Ecological Policy, the Union for Chemical Security, the Center for the
Protection of Wild Nature, and affiliates of Greenpeace and WWF. This
turned out to be the high point for the movement. In 1994 the govern-
ment changed the name of the key agency to the Ministry of Environ-
mental Protection and Natural Resources but granted more importance
to the resource side. Two years later a further reorganization established
the State Committee on Environmental Protection (Goskomekologiya).
The Ministry of Natural Resources continued with its responsibilities
for resources. Two other ministries are for forests and for health. The