Vera Mischenko, Co founder of Ecojuris, Russia’s first public interest law (PIL) organization, is supporting citizen’s rights on environmental issues. She was the first woman to initiate idea of a lawsuit in apex court to challenge a decree that allowed marine discharge of toxic wastes from a proposed Exxon drilling operation. She is also founder of Russian Network of Environmental Lawyers. Photo credit: Goldman Environmental Prize
Evgenia Chirikova, an engineer and a mother of two, moved her family from the heavily urbanized city of Moscow to its northern suburbs to be closer to the Khimki forests, known as the green lungs of Moscow. However, the Russian government’s plans to construct a highway from Moscow to St. Petersburg became public, a proposal which would greatly affect the Khimki forests, Chirikova began her career as a grassroots activist. She successfully gathered a crowd of 5,000 people and garnered 50,000 signatures to protect the forest. Despite the highly volatile political reaction as a consequence of Chirikova’s activism, Chirikova and her colleagues managed to convince the European Bank of Reconstruction and Development and the European Investment Bank, major financiers of the highway, to withdraw their support from the project. Photo credit: The Goldman Environmental Prize
Olga Speranskaya is a Russian scientist and Director of the Chemical Safety Program at the Eco-Accord Center for Environment and Sustainable Development (Eco-Accord). She leads a coalition of organizations, government representatives and academics in 11 countries from the former Soviet Union. This network is focused on identifying and eliminating toxic chemicals from the environment and diminishing exposure that can harm people’s health. Her campaign works towards a toxic-free environment and convinced nine national governments to accept the Stockholm Convention forbidding the dumping of pollutants into the environment. Photo credit: The Goldman Environmental Prize
Goldman Environmental Prize recipient Marina Rikhvanova dedicates her life to protecting human and environmental health from the harmful impacts of the Russian government’s petroleum and nuclear projects. As co-chair and co-founder of Baikal Environmental Wave, Rikhvanova led a successful, four-year campaign against an oil pipeline project that risked polluting Siberia’s Lake Baikal, a significant ecological and cultural site. She continues to mobilize Russians against nuclear development through public protests and citizen training camps. Photo credit: Goldman Environmental Prize
