Members Of The International Association Of Space Flights' Participants Are Concerned With The Ecological Situation In Kazakhstan

Members of the International Association of space flights' participants intend to send recommendations to the government of Kazakhstan related to the ecological situation in the republic. On Tuesday at a press conference Russian cosmonaut Gennady Strekalov reported that the recommendations were worked out in the course of the 17th international congress of cosmonauts and astronauts which took place in Alma Ata on the basis of the data collected in space. 40 members of the Executive committee of the Association from 26 countries of the world participated in the forum, including Aleksei Leonov, Tolgat Musabayev, Americans John Fabian and Andy Turnage. The meeting was dedicated to the theme "Space gates and environmental protection". Gennady Strekalov explained that Kazakhstan was chosen as the congress venue because "there emerged several ecologically unsafe regions and from outer space causes of the ecological catastrophes were sufficiently visible". In the opinion of the Russian cosmonaut, all of them were results of the human negligent activity. He stressed that, in particular, the Aral sea dried out because of the uncontrolled water intake, the Balkhash lake was poisoned by wastes from industrial enterprises built on its coast, the former Semipalatinsk nuclear testing ground was maimed by nuclear explosions. Gennady Strekalov indicated that in the course of the congress scientists and cosmonauts summarized space expeditions' materials and worked out environmental protection recommendations to be sent to the government of Kazakhstan.