From BBC Wildlife to Yahoo.com, the USA to Singapore, famous and respected media are recognizing the importance of the UNESCO Lake Ohrid region and tuning in to the latest events.
2017
SEP: France’s La Croix reports on how green issues in the UNESCO Ohrid region are becoming an important political issue in the Republic of Macedonia. (French)
SEP: Fake news, threats and criminalization feature as (failed) attempts at disruption and derailment of Ohrid SOS by authorities come to the attention of an international audience thanks to Stop Persection, a platform run by Arnika and Ecohome, NGOs from the Czech Republic and Belarus respectively.
AUG: The BBC goes scuba-diving into the Ohrid region’s ancient history!
JAN: The SOS message goes global via Agence France-Presse with a Rachel O’Brien authored article that reaches India, Taiwan, the Middle East, global media giants MSN and the influential Science X. And that’s just the English-language version.
2016
SEP: Al Jazeera Balkans updates South East Europe on the cultural and natural heritage it stands to lose, interviewing Prof. Trajce Talevski, core Ohrid SOS activist and expert at the Republic of Macedonia’s Hydrobiological Institute.
JUN: Wetland Science and Practice, the in-house journal of the Society of Wetland Scientists (SWS), publishes Studenchishte Marsh as an Integral Part of Lake Ohrid: Current status and need for protection, a paper authored by an inter-organizational team, including Dr. Nadezda Apostolova of Ohrid SOS, and president of the SWS European Chapter, Dr. Jos Verhoeven.
JAN: “Precious Lake, Bleak Future” runs the headline from Straits Times in Singapore.
2015
DEC: Lake Ohrid’s “most critical ecosystem is set to be concreted over to make space for apartments and a marina” warns journalist Fred Pearce in a Studenchishte-focused article for the UK’s New Scientist. Titled Europe’s Oldest Lake Faces Destruction to Make Way for Tourists, the story also features in The Independent.
OCT: An aggressive EBRD and MK government assault on a world heritage habitat “as delicate as it is dramatic, as beguiling as it is divine” is the subject of a no-holds-barred SOS-authored exposé for The Ecologist that covers almost the full range of environmentally damaging planned projects in the Ohrid region.
OCT: What Euro value can you place on millions of years of natural heritage? El Pais, Spain’s most circulated medium, invites Ohrid SOS activist Dr. Nadezda Apostolova to explain the dangers that haunt the UNESCO Ohrid region. (Spanish)
OCT: Ohrid SOS activist Elena Nikolovska explains how the EBRD-backed road and resort plans for National Park Galichica will imperil a biosphere mountain and two ancient lakes AND why biodiversity offsets will do little to help. Quotes come from Macedonian ecologist Lazo Naumoski and Dr. Bernd Wagner of Cologne University.
SEP: The North American Lake Management Society informs freshwater fans across America of why one of Earth’s most beautiful, unusual and species-rich lakes requires their urgent support.
AUG: Dr. Thomas Wilke and Dr. Christian Albrecht, two international scientists with extensive research history and several published journal papers related to Lake Ohrid, describe the ancient lake as a Paradise in Peril for popular Macedonian magazine Fokus, overviewing how plans like the drainage of Studenchishte Marsh will cause irreversible damage.
AUG: Alongside several competitors including local champion Evgenij Pop Acev, Swimming World Magazine recognizes the “ecological attack” at the site of a long-standing event on the professional long-distance swimming circuit: the FINA Lake Ohrid Open Water Grand Prix.
JUL: BBC Wildlife interviews Macedonian ecologist Martina Blinkova and Ohrid SOS activist Dragana Velkovska to detail risks to “Balkan Galapagos” Lake Ohrid. “If they destroy the marsh, they will destroy the lake,” warns Velkovska.
JUN: The International Society of Limnology (SIL), an expert organization of freshwater experts, invites Ohrid SOS activists to sound the alarm for Lake Ohrid and National Park Galichica in SILNews 66, leading to an upsurge in big-name signatures on the Declaration to preserve the World Natural and Cultural Heritage of the Ohrid region.
2003
SEP: National Geographic sounds the warning that the endemic Ohrid trout is nearing extinction due to pollution and overfishing. 15 years later the same dangers are pushing it to the edge again.
Ohrid SOS 