Instead of stopping the further devastation of Tara, the Minister Pavle Radulović, with his latest statements, is taking personal responsibility for destroying the river under the international protection.
The Minister Radulović first claimed that the Environmental Impact Assessment Study allowed the relocation of the Tara River flow, and after MANS published this document, Radulović now claims that the riverbed has not been moved, instead it is about its regulation.
This statement by the Minister Radulović is obviously false, as evidenced by the satellite images of that area available on earth.google.com which show that the Tara riverbed at the controversial location has been moved for about half a mile in length.
This was confirmed by the Chinese company CRBC, which, after MANS posted the images, publicly announced that it had moved the Tara riverbed and noted that it was foreseen by the Main Project of the highway.
Parts of the main project of the highways that are completed are declared secret, as well as the conceptual design of the highway, so the public cannot know if these documents envisage the relocation of Tara, and therefore who is responsible for the devastation.
However, both the Impact Assessment Study and the Strategic Environmental Assessment for the Detailed Spatial Plan of this area prohibit the relocation of the Tara river flow due to its status as a protected area.
The statement by Minister Radulović that it is the regulation of the riverbed is a complete nonsense, since on the footage published by MANS every citizen can see that Tara is buried and that construction machinery and material are now at the place of the former riverbed. Comparing this with the embankment and promenade along the river is inappropriate and shows that the Minister Radulović does not have even a slightest responsibility towards the citizens since he is trying to convince them to trust him more than their own eyes.
Instead of immediately banning works and preventing further devastation of Tara, which is under international protection throughout its course, the Minister claims that it is a conspiracy theory in the eve of the arrival of the UNESCO mission. Unfortunately for Montenegro, this mission is arriving precisely because of the risk of Kotor and Tara losing the status of protected areas due to irresponsible individuals such as the Minister Radulović and megalomaniac appetites of investors whose needs are met at any price.
We are asking the Prime Minister Duško Marković to protect Tara from further devastation and announce to the public who will pay the huge costs of remediation – citizens of Montenegro or the Chinese company. We are asking the Government to remove the seal of secrecy from the conceptual and main highway project, especially for this area, so that the citizens would finally know who is responsible for the destruction of Tara, that is, whether the government allowed the devastation or CRBC violated the law.
Vanja Ćalović Marković, MANS Executive Director
Has Tara riverbed been relocated?
THEN NOW
See for yourself at earth.google.com
