ASTRAKHAN (Sputnik), Anastasia Levchenko — Russia and Kazakhstan plan to take coordinated efforts in fighting sturgeon poaching, a common problem for both countries, a representative of law enforcement of the Astrakhan Region told Sputnik.
Despite the moratorium on the commercial fishing of sturgeons that Russia introduced in 2002 and Kazakhstan among other Caspian littoral states supported in 2014, fishing of this precious species continues, and poaching is widespread.
"In April this year the Administration of Russia's Interior Ministry for the Astrakhan Region and a corresponding body of Kazakhstan signed a joint plan of actions to preserve biological resources [of the Caspian Sea]. Joint raids to the places of sturgeon poaching and exchange of information are among other planned activities," Mikhail Shevyakov, representing the department for bioterrorism of the Astrakhan Region Administration of Russia's Interior Ministry, told Sputnik.
With other Caspian bordering states, however, there are no agreements on such cooperation.
It is important for Russia to work together with Kazakhstan to eliminate poaching, as there are transborder criminal groups, according to the law enforcement official. However, he could not specify how numerous such groups are.
Legal status of the Caspian Sea and access to its ample mineral and biological resources is subject of long-standing disputes between the five littoral states — Russia, Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, Azerbaijan and Iran. Sturgeons live in the fresh waters of rivers around, but come to the Caspian Sea for spawning.
Today more and more analysts concur that sturgeons are doomed to total extinction in some five years. Poaching, water pollution, lack of concerted actions of the Caspian states and their reluctance to sign a binding agreement imposing a moratorium on the commercial fishing of this highly precious species is underneath inexorable declining of its population, which started after the collapse of the Soviet Union and became even more dramatic in 2005.
