at seven thirty pm mosque out time these are the top stories from our team the military takes charge of egypt and while the west how is the ousting of the president of the triumph of democracy analysts wonder just how much of an american agenda that new democracy will involve. the graces of potentially the next american president as well as their bold plans for the country are revealed to the conservative party conference in washington. and as ukraine prepares to co-host the next euro championships we discover a traditional instrument that might just out seeing the world cup in from this with

sale as. well in terms of things to do and see options in russia are as vast as the country itself however poor infrastructure means that only extreme tourism is taking off next al gore no i've talked to the president of the russian geographical society about ways to improve the situation. hello again a welcome to spotlight on r.t.i. malvern off and today my guest in the studio is shy. many russians are unaware of their historical heritage and the natural treasures to. addressing their russian jew graphical society prime minister putin said there are lots of places in russia which can become popular tourist attractions but poor infrastructure could

have only for extreme tourists so what can be done to improve the situation and why has the russian emergencies minister become the president of the russian geographical society here's. the russian geographical society's one of the oldest of its kind in the world established in the meet nineteenth century it set out to reserves the boss regions of russia today the task has been enlarged to popularizing russian culture and nature and environment protection the society is supported by the very top of the russian political elite its president who is also the emergencies minister with prime minister putin heading the board of trustees. thank you for being with us today hello. michael well the first thing i'd like to austin is why the emergencies minister and everyone in russia knows you as the

mergence is minister. presides over the geographical society. is there some sort of emergency with geography. you know first of all it's very interesting. to you personally mentioning to me personally. i find it extremely interesting and the second reason is that this society probably the oldest non-governmental organisation in our country. it's one hundred sixty fifth anniversary last year. another reason is that it has a remarkably interesting history a great number over. an outstanding people if you recall the famous russian audience picture the meeting of the state council. eighty percent of the people for trade there were members of the russian geographical society members of the russians are going to feel society right. the

society has reached traditions are conscious and it was this is europe's largest year graphical library containing four hundred forty thousand volumes in russia yes there must be if there is it in moscow and st petersburg petersburg yes it has archives of various famous travelers like preserve. them. well in the us media hollywood has a great impact on everything. because they have this fantastic film indiana jones you've probably seen it's what they said made this profession very popular. but what about russia do russian students dream of becoming a travelling with media even more everyone is thinking of you go into business. that's exactly why we have decided to address this issue in the serious manner.

if you consider all the trouble or some expeditions say over the past two centuries you will realise that we need to do our best to promote this work and not just the government. people to should encourage people to love their country. to explore their country to explore its nature it's just nice it is arts and crafts. you know there are many branches in geography for example economic geography. geographical statistics and so forth i'm pretty sure you know what i'm talking about the other was to i'm grateful to the people who launch such projects is the my planet channel as they would thank you personally i consider it among the best projects of the recent years as.

this channel received an award recently yes and i would like to congratulate them because they're really good investment it up they're doing a good job a very good job. with the board of trustees and its chairman. will award grants each year and we did that we needed last year and this year i think will come together even more maybe a pro to this don't want tell the legibility criteria for such support an overseas candidates yes they can they're eligible which if they want to receive a grant and then you to submit an application and we have a board of very famous research travellers explorers in geography murders and this commission where there's board and they come together and consider the plea cations like i mean what all those applications like i want to go to the off to can photograph a whole there's no nocturnal like that

a research project could go out of course an applicant should state that purpose of their research it's subject matter it's expected outcomes and benefits and what the end product is whether it's a documentary or air report or a paper and expected cost perhaps naturally tradin clude expected costs. well after the fall of the saw its union mania institutions fell apart and as far as i know many activists on a regional history you were all left without support even though they were a unique specialist civil i lived to this end when you clearly does the geographical society help them these days. through the creation of course. of course in fact recently we had a meeting of the geographical society and we invited all those enthusiasts who preserved very museums i mean both their staff and their buildings and.

i can give you a lot of examples for instance the. original history has the nicest building in town which was built with donations from the russian child graphical society and also from local merchants to governor another prominent figures including by the way descendants of the end decemberists but it's the nicest building in there. of course it no longer belongs to the geographical society in houses the museum of regional history now. but they have preserved many of the traditions was thanks to those people you have mentioned that there was these people who preserved the archives in st petersburg and both the archives in the organization and let us talk there used to be a museum there too. much was lost during the saudi it era and especially during the

post soviet period. i think we'll start to recovering in a revolving all that now. you're talking about history but times change don't they said previously those expeditions you talk to mt were sent off to explore and fill in the blanks paul saw in geographic magazine. and first and foremost on russia's and that it was in the middle of the nineteenth century when the world's map wasn't complete yet what about today is what are the goals of the russian geographical decided today school and. first of all our goal is to continue studying the wild nature of both plants and animals of russia. this year we're running a big program on the arctic covering such as it says environment protection at the economic issues they study of the foreign the wants and the ethnic minorities and their cultural traditions which need to be preserved or even if they're idiots and

i think this is a noble goal. there is another goal is if you ask an average school student to d. how many ethnic groups live in our country they most probably wouldn't just say many more who would say may most probably that are those that are clever but the thing is every single athan group has a unique culture which goes back for centuries in time they possess unique candy craft skills with some right fellowships are granted for this purpose by the way in particular the grants we shoot in two thousand and nine and two thousand and ten. and we do you value the researchers who work in this area and promote this knowledge gal and they shoot documentaries write books. and know we are trying to revive the past to reduce. the russians your graphical society that i see a good such as the scenic russia project of the nineteenth century. such things are

really precious and i'm not talking about money. it's about giving our people and i me that i'm a sound of between magic now giving our people as solid a feeling of motherland. in a weariness. that this is my mother in law. that's what it's like. love it and how i. am i already and i would put the word father wise if you don't know your mother in law. what is the year for you to love you. distribute the british well let's take a look at the history of russia's geographical exploration in a report from a spotlight on the demeter. here in moscow in the very heart of continental russia is a special place for seal lovers in seafarers the history of russia's navigation and

geographical exploration is written on this wall these are the names of russia's coahuila says for example these play here is in memory of all the key cheer of gov the first european never to set foot on southern no esca who is part of food recall you have center in moscow the lead on that is what the famous russian traveler can say about places like those who the south pole and mt everest his circumnavigated the globe several times and we're still going to caution in this scene who will win both the spirit of adventure is something he must have inherited from junior reaches a version explores. in eighty three this was so two questions on their first ever circumnavigation of earth the expedition was headed by avon crews inch their who later became one of the founders of the russian geographical society which in the shaded systematic exploration of the remote parts of the country among the most famous members were nikolai mickleham a quine who lived for

a one time among native tribes of southeast asia and australia studying and describing their way of life when the cooperation of rural ski who discovered several previously unknown species including a wild horse named after him the soviet union promoted and encouraged exploration the russian plane needs of the arctic like to shmeat or even proponent in who were the first to carry out scientific research and poor rice stations in the one nine hundred thirty s. became national heroes today in the computer technologies in space travel this still appear to be places to explore an earth like the seabed of the north pool which was for the first time reached by a group of russian scientists four years ago a spirit of adventure with its new generations to new discoveries. thing is waiting for new names to be written on. time.

mainly for natural resources which means that they used to bring about benefits the right to say that she's days geographers are more concerned about environment protection than about the exploration of natural resources. and that's exactly why last year we reintroduced the environmental aspect into the geographical society scope of work and by the way it was here before i like to remind you that russia's very first nature reserve. nature reserve was established on the initiative of the russian general graphical society says. the president of the russian pilgrim. pickel society spotlight will be back shortly and we'll be back in the studio in less than a minute after a break so stay with us. for

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welcome back to spotlight i'm all going off and just to remind you that my guest today in the studio here is said again the president of the russian geographical society this means that mr show us in two thousand and ten the russian geographical society held the international arctic forums that's what was received a global public response would become a regular event you planning to conduct another forum this year and what do you think about these forums practical value in general it's. you know it was our first project of this guy and we did it together with theory and know with steam usage in secret and it proved that this kind of dialogue he's in great demand fury coliforms multo was the territory of dialogue our objective was to outline and present our interests and discuss them with our neighbors in the arctic clay

sitting in port so to say that there were delegations from sixteen nations many interesting reports were presented and this brought about the common understanding that such discussions conferences are reports expeditions and the most importantly an exchange of opinions which one will known public figures and politicians including heads of states and governments are something we very much need and so we made a decision to make it a manual event and right now we are busy preparing the next arctic forum in twenty eleven that means. of russia one of your board members prime minister putin gave a speech at the last forum and he said some tough words every want to dig thorough clean up of the arctic and in the first place to get rid of the nuclear waste buried there has the work started yet did you hear the call of mr putin here in russia we did and in other countries what about your colleagues. for other

countries we haven't heard of any significant or specific actions which would develop into a consistent program off going up to the arctic region. this is you know our country we have a located funds in the federal budget and signed contracts with companies which will work on this project. the ministry of natural resources he's monitoring this work and naturally we to monitor the situation to see we are we are today in the arctic. the. projects have been planned for this year. project is work in progress it's under way we are starting the migration path center habitats of polar bears. this project is underway and we expect it to continue. in the next you might know that we had

a major expedition. which was led by the chairman of the board by the way. this expedition managed to achieve the laws for this work will be continued this year we would like to send it begin a comprehensive expedition and i think that pretty soon possibly sometime in april we'll start screening candidates. students for russia's major universities to take part in the expedition to then use a beer in arlen's it's a sign for an incredibly interesting research in many different fields. that you cooperate closely with environmentalists you mentioned earlier that the work of protecting the environment is on your priority list. and the environmentalists have raised in the lawn now a lot in the news about the future plans of b.p. and ross knapp's to develop an oil field in the south and part of the car a c.

at the proud it does this project indeed present a serious environmental threat to that region or are they just being precautious but having seen the old out of cool. insured i'd say they're pretty cautious because of course any such a project involves a very serious preliminary research and analysis my x. birds and security specialists especially after that incident in the gulf of mexico. in my opinion it was a huge you know our mental disaster. so to talking over protection and environments. movements in general are the me. what i would call it could be politicized often marmont protection that's a killer here with a good that is what i mean is that political and so it gives being achieved so put

it through environmental means. does this politicize ation of environment protection affect your work it seems that it does from the way you speak. don't you see it here so that environmental movements and the very idea of an environment protection get more and more involved in the division no markets which get used as a tool to prevent a company or a nation from answering certain markets such as the hydrocarbons market. you might notice that during the discussion of sea pipeline construction projects when building a gas pipeline for example the point is often to resort to environmental arguments . among other things of course but the point i'm making is that when an mar a mental disaster happens people start throwing political slogans let me think that it's interesting that you a politician ish and you're

a veteran minister say shows for you know one of our country's most influential positions and yet you're against the politicized environment protection that it is now what does that mean for you your posts in the government and your role in the russian geographical society a completely different things with resonating with c. such as family and a korea something like that. it's something of petty as is possible at all the you think no no i have to admit it and naturally i'm very grateful to my colleagues at my main place of work for their a tremendous support including help in organizing expeditions because in the ministries that stand a comprehensive network of training and rescue centers as well as a great number of rescue squads are a unique resource we can use to ensure the safety and working conditions for our expeditions. that's something no other agency has i would think that's why it is

quite hard to separate these two jobs and when i talk about the polls you say zation of in my. arment protection i didn't mean that my membership in a political party or my position as a minister should have no impact on what i do you at the russian geographical society god so you mean using environmental protection as political leverage. that's exactly what i mean. yes that's exactly what i mean. you know it's a well known fact that there are many environmental organizations that are actually becoming less and less concerned with environment and at the same time the more and more concerned with politics. what particular organizations do you mean. i would rather not name them because i don't want to advertise them. i would advise our people not to join those

organizations because they are in misleading when people tell you you can't do these stories data because it causes harm to the environment and your health. and they say this without any preliminary study or any research any examination. without engaging in japan and x. births and even without conducting primitive laboratory tests they would get washed of this home is me putting them on my gore. should let him play even one more question if he there have been reports that the russian jew graphical society along with the into restrained agency said that i going to develop ecotourism in russia but i was ready to. tell us more about this project do you really have such plans that will push. your european viewers probably know that there is such

a thing as a greek culture and tourism in europe that. when young people go to the countryside and we want to form and they so. they harvest they take care of animals well in russia that would need stream tourism or other. variety of eco tourism. but in our country it's much more interesting. because we have the world's biggest a reserve war all freshwater in lake baikal. so why not send an expedition there. to help preserve the lake. and at the same time explored with what might harm it. or for example sure we can arrange environmental expeditions to some

endangered polices. so that people can not only see some things that there was there were some exotic places for example with their own eyes and at the same time. they would be able to. people about them told people what is being done to make sure that industrial facilities pollute the environment so i think it's a promising project. thank you very much for being with us and just a reminder that my guest today was sygate the president of the russian graphical society and that's it for from all of us here moving back with more comments on what's going on. outside russia until then stay on r.t. and take it.