Log in to hire Sitara Thalia

Sitara Thalia Ambrosio

Photojournalist and Visual Storyteller.
    
NZZ am Sonntag: Why Nature also suffers from the War
Public Project
NZZ am Sonntag: Why Nature also suffers from the War
Copyright Sitara Thalia Ambrosio 2024
Updated Oct 2022
Topics Media
NZZ am Sonntag: Why nature also suffers from the war
Written by the wonderful Andrea Jeska 
The story 

South of the western Ukrainian city of Lviv in the Carpathian Mountains, all seems well. The war is an event in another world. In the Transcarpathian region, on the border with Romania, lies Rakhiv, a sleepy little town with 15,000 inhabitants. A unique belt of copper beeches stretches from Rakhiv to the west for 200 kilometers. The world's oldest beech trees can be found there: up to 35 meters high and up to 600 years old. These forests have never been cultivated, no human foot has trampled the vegetation. These are some of the last primeval beech forests in Europe, a Unesco-recognized World Heritage Site. They are still intact. But the war is endangering their existence.

In total, the fires caused by attacks in July 2022 have already destroyed 100,000 hectares of nature. This is according to satellite data from the European Forest Fire Information System. Even before the war, there had already been a loss of biodiversity in Ukraine, according to the WWF, and climate change had taken its toll on nature. The war is exacerbating an already tense situation and is also preventing improvements, as all relevant activities and investments have virtually ceased.

Even though there is still peace in Transcarpathia, there have also been problems with forest protection there since the war began. This is because the rangers and foresters are at the front or have joined the self-defense groups, and now the daily guard rounds are missing..


NZZ am Sonntag
Empfehlungen der Redaktion, Schwerpunkte und Entdeckungen aus dem NZZ Magazin.
Magazin.nzz.ch
1,558

Also by Sitara Thalia Ambrosio —

Project

Ver.di publik: Ukrainian trade unions - Negotiating tariffs, supporting colleagues, enduring war.

Sitara Thalia Ambrosio
Project

Photo essay: On the road in southern Kurdistan.

Sitara Thalia Ambrosio / South Kurdistan / Irak
Project

Taz die Tageszeitung: A room in the Nazi neighborhood.

Sitara Thalia Ambrosio
Project

Climate Crisis and War: When water becomes a weapon.

Sitara Thalia Ambrosio
Project

Fragile as Glass: LGBTQI+ people in Ukraine facing the Russian invasion.

Sitara Thalia Ambrosio / Ukraine
Project

IS processes: Thousands of foreign IS supporters have been imprisoned in north-eastern Syria for years.

Sitara Thalia Ambrosio
Project

Zeit online: "My heart is broken and the pieces lie scattered in Europe"

Sitara Thalia Ambrosio / Rojava
Project

Taz die Tageszeitung: Turkish attacks on Kurds in Syria

Sitara Thalia Ambrosio
Project

WOZ: Rojava before the Turkish elections - Hoping for Erdoğan's End.

Sitara Thalia Ambrosio
Project

The People behind the Border: External Border in Bosnia and Herzegovina

Sitara Thalia Ambrosio
NZZ am Sonntag: Why Nature also suffers from the War by Sitara Thalia Ambrosio
Sign-up for
For more access