PETROPAVLOVSK-KAMCHATSKY, June 21 (RIA Novosti correspondent Oksana Guseva) - The Council of People's Deputies of Kamchatka in Russia's Far East decided at a session Tuesday to hold a referendum on oil production off western Kamchatka's shores on October 23, despite the regional prosecutor's opposition.
He said the legislature was interfering in the central government's jurisdiction.
Parliament members said they had rejected the appeal because it had been filed late and they had only received it Monday.
"Nothing will stop us from creating conditions for the people to express their opinion. People are the supreme authority and they have the right to express their will," said Marat Gagiyev, council deputy chairman.
The referendum initiative group had raised more than 6,000 verified signatures in support of the referendum.
Environmentalists warn the development of oil fields on the shelf will threaten the Sea of Okhotsk's ecosystem.
Robert Moiseyev, the Director of the Kamchatka-based Institute of Environment and Wildlife Management, the Russian Academy of Sciences' branch in the Far East, said there were no more than five places in the world that can be compared to the Sea of Okhotsk in terms of the productive capacity of its bioresources, and that it is the only such place in Russia.
Damage to the ecosystem will inevitably affect the Far Eastern regions' economic development.
Moiseyev insists a comprehensive environmental and economic analysis of possible consequences of oil production has to be done. He said the local population or environmentalists had not been invited to discuss the project.
State-owned oil company Rosneft has a license to develop the Venin block on Sakhalin Island as part of the Sakhalin 3 project and an area on the western Kamchatka shelf.
The shelf contains an estimated 900 million metric tons of oil.
