Aleksey Yablokov

Alexei Vladimirovich Yablokov (; 3 October 1933 – 10 January 2017) was a Soviet and Russian biologist, environmentalist and politician. He helped found Greenpeace of the USSR and advised President Boris Yeltsin on the environment in the early 1990s. From 2005 he led the Green Russia faction of the opposition party Yabloko. He was the lead author of Chernobyl: Consequences of the Catastrophe for People and the Environment. His research concerned whales, dolphins and pinnipeds and the ways they adapt to life in the water.

In that post Yablokov oversaw a government report that disclosed decades of Soviet dumping of radioactive waste at sea. The disclosure brought Russia more than $3 billion in international assistance for cleanup work.

Later politics Yablokov founded the Green Russia party in 2005 and, once it merged into Yabloko, led its faction there until his death. Three years later he signed an appeal against Russia's annexation of Crimea. Alexei Yablokov died in Moscow on 10 January 2017. He also won the Karpinsky Prize, the Nuclear-Free Future Award and a gold medal of the Royal Geographical Society.

Selected works