MOSCOW, March 12 (RIA Novosti) - Prosecutors in the Moscow Region are questioning the deputy head of an environmental watchdog, a spokesperson for the agency said Monday.
The interrogation is being conducted following a move by Moscow Region lawmakers who charged Oleg Mitvol with slander of region Governor Boris Gromov, said the source at the Federal Service for the Oversight of Natural Resources
"The prosecutor is questioning Mitvol over his claim of illegal land assignment in the Barvikha natural preserve," the source said.
A Moscow district court will consider a 50 million ruble ($1.9 million) libel suit March 14 over a paper publication citing Mitvol, which Gromov deems harmful to his reputation.
Mitvol is known for his brutal attack on the illegal construction of buildings in protected environmental zones. He has overseen inspections and the inventory of villas in the Moscow Region, which revealed numerous violations concerned with illegal seizure of state-owned land in order to build elite cottages.
Most violations date back to the Yeltsin era and include the mass seizure of land, construction of buildings in the right-of-way zones, the discharge of sewage into reservoirs (which feed the Moscow water supply system), and the felling of unique first category forests.
