Supreme Court Rejects Appeals Against Decision to Establish ‘Bilohorshcha Peatland’ Reserve
On March 7, 2025, the Cassation Administrative Court of the Supreme Court rejected the appeals by garage cooperatives, which again attempted to annul the decision by the Lviv Regional Council to establish the ‘Bilohorshcha Peatland’ landscape reserve. This was reported by the head of the legal department of the Lviv Regional Council, Yaroslav Hasyak.
History of the Reserve’s Establishment
On October 29, 2019, the Lviv Regional Council decided to establish the ‘Bilohorshcha Peatland’ local reserve. In 2020, the Riasne-Ruske Village Council transferred 15 hectares of the same area into private ownership by garage cooperatives.
After conducting a land inventory in connection with the merging of the Riasne-Ruske Village Council with the Lviv Territorial Community, it was revealed that part of the land plots in the newly created reserve were indeed granted for free to several garage cooperatives. Meanwhile, these cooperatives as legal entities were created after the announcement of the lands in Bilohorshcha as a reserve, in August-September 2020, a month before receiving the land.
Judicial Processes
Legal proceedings regarding the reserve’s land have been ongoing since January 2022. Newly established garage cooperatives then filed a lawsuit demanding the annulment of the Lviv Regional Council’s decision to create the ‘Bilohorshcha Peatland’ reserve.
On July 19, 2023, the first instance court — the Lviv District Administrative Court — made a decision in the case of the ‘Bilohorshcha Peatland’ reserve, deeming the Lviv Regional Council’s decision to create it lawful.
‘This conclusion of the district court was confirmed on December 20, 2023, by the Eighth Administrative Court of Appeal, protecting the legality of the Lviv Regional Council’s decision. And now the court of last instance — the Cassation Administrative Court of the Supreme Court,’ said Yaroslav Hasyak.
He also noted that the legal battle surrounding the creation of the ‘Bilohorshcha Peatland’ reserve has united the Lviv Regional Council, Lviv City Council, Zymnivoda Village Council, Lviv Regional Prosecutor’s Office, Ministry of Environmental Protection and Natural Resources of Ukraine, representatives of the National Association of Lawyers of Ukraine’s Committee on Land, Agrarian, and Environmental Law, the public, and Lviv residents in the protection of the protected natural area.
In August 2024, the Lviv City Ecology Department won a grant of over 4.2 million UAH from the European Union. These funds will be directed towards the restoration of the wetlands in the ‘Bilohorshcha Peatland’ reserve, the installation of wooden walkways, and birdwatching towers. Last autumn, camera traps were installed in the reserve to combat unauthorized dumping.