Features of legal protection of some World Natural Heritage sites in Bulgaria

Kolobov Roman Yur'evich PhD in Law Associate Professor of the Department of International Law and Comparative Jurisprudence of the Irkutsk State University Law Institute; Associate Professor of the Department of Civil Law of the East Siberian Branch of the Russian State University of Justice 664082, Russia, Irkutskaya oblast', g. Irkutsk, ul. Ulan-Batorskaya, 10 roman.kolobov@gmail.com Other publications by this author

Ganeva Ekaterina Olegovna PhD in Law Associate Professor of the Department of Civil Law of the Irkutsk State University Law Institute; Coordinator of the Youth Research Center of the Research Institute of Legal Protection of Lake Baikal ISU 664082, Russia, Irkutskaya oblast', g. Irkutsk, ul. Ulan-Batorskaya, 10 kareva10@mail.ru Other publications by this author

Of particular importance in the protection of unique natural objects is the Convention on the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural Heritage ^[1] (hereinafter – the World Heritage Convention, the Convention). This international treaty created a system of international obligations in relation to such objects, and also served as the basis for the formation of an organizational structure for the protection of world heritage. But at the present stage of the development of international relations, the World Heritage Convention cannot regulate all aspects of heritage protection by self-executing norms of direct action.

This is due to both the extreme diversity of national legal regulation in the issues involved, and their sensitivity from the point of view of the principle of sovereign equality, which acts as a guiding principle in the modern international regulatory system. For this reason, the effective implementation of the provisions of the international legal regime under consideration is possible only in cooperation with national legal systems. This state of affairs leads to the fact that different States use different approaches to fulfilling their international obligations under the Convention. The problems of protection of World Natural Heritage sites in the Russian Federation are also becoming the subject of attention from the World Heritage Committee (hereinafter also referred to as the Committee).

Questions about the implementation of international obligations under the Convention are particularly acute in relation to the protection of Lake Baikal. It seems that an analysis of the practice of protecting World Natural Heritage sites abroad can contribute to the effective implementation of such obligations while respecting the national interests of the Russian Federation. Another task that this study contributes to solving is to fill the obvious shortage of comparative legal research in the field of protection of World Natural Heritage sites.

In this study, the authors turn to the analysis of the experience of protecting World Natural Heritage sites in the Republic of Bulgaria.  According to the World Heritage Center, there are seven cultural heritage sites in Bulgaria, and three natural ones ^[2]: Pirin National Park, Srebyrna Nature Reserve, as well as part of the transnational serial object Ancient and Primeval beech forests of the Carpathians and other regions of Europe. The latter object is a serial object located in eighteen States, and for this reason requires a separate independent analysis.

The object of the study in the first and second parts of this article will be the practice of Bulgaria's fulfillment of international obligations to protect the world Natural Heritage of the Pirin National Park and the Srebyrna Natural Reserve. The main sources for the analysis will be documents of the World Heritage system bodies and regulatory acts of the Republic of Bulgaria. In the third part of the study, the findings will be correlated with the problems of protecting Lake Baikal as a World Heritage site. Based on the results of the analysis, recommendations were formulated to improve the domestic regulatory framework in the field of protection of World Heritage sites in general and Lake Baikal in particular.

1. The practice of interaction of the authorities of the Republic of Bulgaria with the bodies of the World Heritage protection system in relation to the World Heritage site is, in general, an example of constructive interaction between national and international means of nature protection, a balanced and pragmatic attitude to such "acute" international legal instruments as the List of World Heritage under Threat.

The Srebyrna Nature Reserve was included in the World Heritage List (hereinafter also the List) in 1983 at the seventh session of the World Heritage Committee according to the fourth criterion for natural objects (at that time the criteria for cultural and natural objects had not yet been combined). To be included in the World Heritage List, an object must represent an outstanding world heritage. The criteria for determining the territory as a World Natural Heritage site are very high, at least theoretically. To be included in the List, a natural object must have "a significance that is so exceptional that it transcends national borders and represents a common significance for the present and future generations of all mankind" ^{[3, p. 123]}. The status of a World Natural Heritage site provides additional guarantees for the preservation and integrity of unique natural objects and complexes ^{[4, p. 153]}.

In the conclusion of the International Union for Conservation of Nature, based on the results of consideration of the nomination materials (hereinafter also – IUCN), it was noted that Srebyrna is a freshwater lake adjacent to the Danube, with an area of 600 hectares.  The lake was connected to the Danube until the construction of a dam for flood protection in 1949 . Up to 99 species of birds nest on it, as well as up to 80 species of migratory birds ^[5]. At the time of the nomination, the lake was a wetland of international importance in accordance with the Ramsar Convention ^[6], and was also a UNESCO biosphere reserve. The curly pelican, white-eyed dipper, small cormorant and crake were noted among the inhabiting species. At the time of the nomination, the legal protection of the object was provided by a strict reserve regime with clearly defined boundaries. IUCN experts positively noted the desire of the Bulgarian authorities to establish a buffer zone of the site and to carry out cross-border cooperation with nature reserves on the Romanian side of the Danube.

From 1983 to 1991, the ecological state of Srebyrna was not evaluated by the World Heritage protection system. At the fifteenth session of the World Heritage Committee, a sharp deterioration in the ecological state of the lake was noted both in terms of hydrological parameters and the quality of biodiversity ^[7]. The construction of the Iron Gate hydroelectric power plants upstream of the Danube caused a decrease in the water level in the lake and its drying up. Colonies of waterfowl have left the site (with the exception of the curly pelican). The problems of agricultural development have also become acute, in particular, those related to the disposal of pig farm waste. Along with anthropogenic factors, an increase in the population of wild boars and foxes has been noted, which threaten the populations of the curly pelican. In this regard, a joint mission with Ramsar structures was sent to the site to assess its compliance with the fourth criterion for inclusion in the World Heritage List.

The international legal reaction to such a deterioration of the object's condition proceeded in two directions.

The first direction was that the Committee recommended that the Secretariat request from the Bulgarian Ministry of Environment to nominate the object to the List of World Heritage in Danger. In 1992, the object was included in the specified List with the consent of representatives of Bulgaria (since 1993, the object has also been included in the Montreux Protocol – the "red" list of the Ramsar System for the Protection of Wetlands of International Importance). During the existence of the World Heritage protection system, there has been a different attitude to this list. The Governments of some States are quite sensitive to such a prospect and are making maximum diplomatic efforts to prevent the inclusion of the object in the List of World Heritage under threat. A striking example of this attitude is the approach of Australia, which suppresses attempts to include the Great Barrier Reef in the list under consideration. Another group of Governments demonstrates a pragmatic attitude to such a prospect and themselves take the initiative to include objects in the List of World Heritage in Danger, or do not object to their inclusion. In addition to the already mentioned position of Bulgaria, this approach is followed, for example, by the United States of America. Two World Natural Heritage sites: Yellowstone National Park and Everglades National Park were included in the UNESCO Red List at the request of the American government, the latter twice.

The second direction of the reaction of the World Heritage structures was to consider the possibility of excluding the Srebyrna Nature Reserve from the World Heritage List. The Bureau of the Committee at its meeting recommended discussing this issue at a meeting of the Committee in December 1992, since the object, although it retains value as a Ramsar site and a biosphere reserve, but its value as a World Heritage site has been lost ^[8]. It is indeed possible to exclude objects from the List of World Heritage Sites, but this possibility is given the properties of responsibility in some media, it is considered as a punishment for refusing to comply with the Committee's instructions. However, this understanding of object delisting does not correspond to the real state of things. The Convention itself does not specify the grounds and procedure for excluding objects from the List of World Heritage Sites.

The relevant provisions are contained in the Guidelines for the Implementation of the Convention on the Protection of the World Cultural and Natural Heritage (hereinafter also referred to as the Guidelines), periodically reviewed by the World Heritage Committee. The Guide contains the main principles of the Convention, and is also a reflection of the decisions taken by the Committee, which are thoroughly discussed by the members of the Committee ^{[9, p. 30]}.  Both the 1992 Manual ^[10] and the current edition ^[11] provide two grounds for exclusion. Firstly, if the condition of the object has deteriorated so much that it has lost the characteristics that determined its inclusion in the World Heritage List. Secondly, if, as a result of anthropogenic impact, the object was threatened with loss of qualities already at the time of its nomination, and the necessary corrective measures submitted by the State party to the Convention at that time were not taken on time.

According to the website of the World Heritage Center, three objects have been excluded during the existence of the World Heritage protection system: two cultural heritage sites (the Elbe Valley near Dresden, Germany; Liverpool – the city of sailors and merchants, Great Britain) and one natural (the Arabian Antelope Reserve, Oman). All of them were excluded precisely because of the loss of outstanding universal value.

In accordance with the 1992 edition of the Manual (paragraph 42), consultations were held with the Bulgarian side, which expressed its intention to take a number of measures to restore the qualities of Srebyrna. In 1993, the Bureau recommended postponing for two years the decision to exclude the site from the World Heritage List, and in the future, until the end of the nineties, various measures were carried out to restore the ecological state of the Natural Reserve. 

In 1994, the Bureau of the Committee approved a request for technical assistance for the purchase and installation of equipment for changing and monitoring the level and quality of water in the lake. In 1995, the construction of a canal connecting the lake and the Danube was noted, which led to an increase in the water level by one meter. At the twenty-second session, the World Heritage Committee, based on the report of the mission to the site, noted significant progress in the restoration of the Srebyrna ecosystem. In addition to the restoration of the water level, a decrease in nitrogen and phosphate concentrations was noted; restoration of phytoplankton and fish diversity; increase in populations of curly pelican and other waterfowl; preparation of a law on protected areas in accordance with international and European standards.

Among the decisions taken by the Committee at the twenty-second session, it can be noted that the Committee supports plans for the creation of a transboundary world Heritage site based on Srebyrna, as well as the formulation of conditions for the exclusion of an object from the List of World Heritage in danger. The latter included, in particular, the adoption of the law on protected areas, the formation of a World Heritage site management plan and the regime of the buffer zone of the World Heritage site. Moreover, the last two mentioned activities were recommended to be carried out jointly with local communities and non-profit organizations. The Law on Protected Areas was adopted in 1999, and the facilities management plan was approved on December 11, 2001. All these positive trends led to the exclusion of the site from the List of World Heritage under Threat in 2003.

The buffer zone of the facility was established in 2008 by the decision of the Committee 32 SOM 8B.47 with an area of 673 hectares. The IUCN in its conclusion on this issue noted the adequacy of the size of the proposed buffer zone ^[12]. After 2009, no decisions were made on the Srebyrna Natural Reserve, from which it can be concluded that plans for the creation of a transboundary World Heritage Site remained unrealized. At the same time, such cooperation is carried out within the framework of the Ramsar Convention. On April 15, 2013, the Ministers of Environmental Protection of Bulgaria and Romania asked the secretariat of the Ramsar Convention to recognize Srebyrna and Lake Calarash in Romania as transboundary Ramsar lands ^[13]. It is possible that the progress in international cooperation under the Convention on Wetlands of International Importance is due to simpler procedures for adding objects to the Ramsar List.

The considered practice of fulfilling international obligations to protect the world Natural Heritage Srebyrna Nature Reserve is an example of fruitful interaction between national and international means of nature protection. The systematic implementation of restoration and environmental measures in coordination with the international expert community allowed to reverse the negative trends in the development of the ecological state of a unique natural object and prevent its degradation and disappearance. In all the analyzed documents of the World Heritage protection system, one of the most acute threats to the preservation of World Heritage sites is missing – the development of tourist infrastructure, which may have predetermined a favorable outcome for Srebyrna. This factor has become central to the development of the second World Heritage Site, which is the subject of consideration in this article – the Pirin National Park.

2. Pirin National Park was also included in the World Heritage List in 1983. In the conclusion of the IUCN ^[14], based on the results of the analysis of the nomination materials, it is indicated that the park covers an area of 27400 hectares at an altitude of from a kilometer to 2915 meters. 60 percent of the park's territory is covered with forests, and a significant number of endemic plant species grow on its territory. The site was found to meet criteria 1-3 for inclusion in the World Heritage List. From 1983 to 2000, the ecological state of the park was the subject of consideration by the World Heritage protection system only three times. In 1985, the ninth session of the World Heritage Committee noted the construction of a hotel and ski resort on the Vihren and opposition to the construction by local environmental groups. Explanations on this issue were expected in 1986, but familiarization with the results of subsequent meetings of the Committee and its Bureau shows that this issue was not raised until 2000. In 1986, a general improvement in the condition of the object was noted ^[15], and in 1991 support was expressed for plans to expand the object and the possible creation of a cross-border World Heritage site with Greece ^[16].

Since 2000, the issue of threats to the ecological state from the developing tourist infrastructure has come to the fore in the decisions of the Committee and the conclusions of the IUCN. In 2000 The International Union for Conservation of Nature noted the incoming information about plans to expand the ski resort, which may entail the felling of trees and a threat to the flora and fauna of the object ^[17]. As it turned out, the territorial development plan submitted to the Ministry of Environment and Water Resources provides for the expansion of the resort through the construction of five ski trails and maintenance equipment, parking lots and a funicular connecting this area with the city of Bansko. A separate feature of the ongoing processes is the active participation of the public and environmental non–profit organizations in discussing and resolving issues of protecting the World Heritage site. The Bureau of the Committee separately noted a letter received in 2001 from environmental non-profit organizations that expressed disagreement with the plans for the expansion of the resort, in particular, for reasons of non-identification of alternatives to the development of the project and its contradiction with the park management plan, as well as the principle of priority of nature protection over recreational purposes of using national parks ^[18].

The mission that visited the facility in 2002 noted that the plan to expand the tourist infrastructure itself is small in size. With effective management and control without additional intensive use and development, the expected increase in the number of tourists will not exceed the permissible limits of changes or negative impact on the values of the World Heritage site. At the same time, it is necessary to take compensatory measures, including: ensuring effective management of the facility and reforestation measures. Obviously, in the conclusion of the mission, an attempt was made to indicate the balance of environmental interests, on the one hand, and the interests of economic development and popularization of the object, on the other. Thus, pointing to the fundamental possibility of implementing the project if a number of conditions are met, the mission report emphasizes that the expansion of ski resorts was not allowed at other World Heritage sites ^[19].

Among the conclusions of the mission that deserve special attention, it is necessary to note the identified shortcomings in the nomination materials concerning the definition of the boundaries of the object. Since the inclusion of the site in the World Heritage List, this issue has caused discrepancies. Thus, the Bulgarian authorities believed that they had already increased the area of the World Heritage Site by expanding the boundaries of the protected area of the Pirin National Park to 40,332.4 hectares. It is noted that this obviously happened due to a misunderstanding of the procedure for increasing the area of the object, since such an increase is possible only through international legal procedures. It should be noted that the problem of misunderstanding the boundaries of the object is also found in relation to other World Heritage sites. Thus, in 2008, the Committee noted that a significant part of the Belovezhskaya Pushcha facility probably did not receive proper management in accordance with established standards, since the Belarusian state authorities believed that only the protected area was included in the boundaries of the facility ^[20]. The issue of the boundaries of the World Natural Heritage site Pirin National Park was resolved in 2010, when the World Heritage Committee approved the expansion of its area. At the same time, the tourist zones of Bansko and Dobrinishte were excluded from the World Heritage Site. As noted in the conclusion of the IUCN based on the results of consideration of the nomination materials, capital construction facilities (roads, five hotels, ski trails infrastructure, biathlon center, etc.) are located in these territories, which is incompatible with the status of a World Heritage site. These territories were included in the buffer zone.

It is interesting to note that at its thirty-fourth session in 2010, the Committee expressed a separate request to the Bulgarian authorities to take all necessary measures to prevent the incorrect use of the World Heritage emblem, including in the resort of Bansko, which cannot be considered as an example of sustainable use of a World Heritage site. Small areas of the territory (about 150 hectares) were excluded from the World Heritage Site because they did not possess the qualities of outstanding universal value. At the subsequent thirty-sixth session of the Committee in 2012, the issue of borders was raised due to the need for their precise demarcation using the GPS system ^[21]. The problem of defining boundaries arose in relation to various World Heritage sites, which indicates the need to improve the standards for consideration of nominations that existed in the first decades after the adoption of the Convention. With regard to the World Heritage site Lake Baikal, questions have also been raised about the certainty of its borders, which will be discussed in the third part of this article.

 In addition, it was noted the need to submit a temporary management plan (before the preparation of the main plan within the framework of the Bulgarian-Swiss project) and the creation of a scientific advisory council (such plans were outlined in the nomination materials).

The management plan was adopted on August 6, 2004 and provided for the allocation of six zones: zones of reserve, limited human impact, conservation of forest ecosystems and recreation, sustainable use of open areas and recreation, tourism, buildings and structures ^[20]. Despite this, the Committee in 2005 expressed concern about the development of tourism at the World Heritage Site ^[23]. These two interrelated issues: the formation of an object management plan and the development of tourist infrastructure – have become the dominant topics in the decisions of the Committee on the state of Pirin National Park.

In 2011, the Committee asked the Bulgarian authorities to suspend the development of ski resorts both within the World Heritage Site and in its buffer zone, as well as to guarantee that the new management plan will not provide for the construction of new tourism facilities, as well as the expansion of the tourist zone to the World Heritage Site.

The development of a new management plan for the facility was carried out without carrying out its strategic environmental assessment (hereinafter also referred to as SEA), which, according to the Bulgarian Ministry of Environment and Water Resources, was not required. Non-profit environmental organizations successfully challenged this decision in the Supreme Administrative Court in 2020, which was noted by the Committee at the 44th session in 2021 ^[24], which asked Bulgaria to carry out such an assessment as a priority. Along with this, amendments to the current plan of 2004 were canceled, which provided for the expansion of tourist infrastructure facilities.

The general issues of developing management plans for specially protected territories in the Republic of Bulgaria are regulated by the Law on Protected Territories ^[25]. One of its positive features is the detailed regulation of the preparation of management plans for protected areas (in Russian terminology – specially protected natural territories). The second section of the fourth chapter from Article 55 to Article 66a contains the general and most important requirements for the preparation of management plans. Thus, article 55 contains a requirement to prepare a management plan for each specially protected natural area, which must be updated every ten years. The content of such a plan should reflect, in particular, the general characteristics of the territory; the objectives of its management; rules, regimes, conditions or recommendations for the conduct of activities, the construction of buildings and structures. At the same time, the requirements of international treaties must be taken into account (Article 56). When developing plans, public hearings are held with the participation of authorities and the public. The results of such public discussion are attached to the draft plan in the form of a protocol (Article 59). National parks management plans are approved by the Council of Ministers on the proposal of the Minister of Environment and Water Resources, subject to a positive conclusion of the Expert Council under this Ministry. Such legislative decisions should be recognized as extremely successful, since the adoption of the need to prepare management plans at the level of the law ensures the mandatory development of such documents, and the approval by the supreme executive authority increases their importance

3. One of the main objectives of comparative legal research is to assess the possibility of using the experience of some States in other States. The ways to solve the problem of nature protection identified in two Bulgarian World Heritage sites have, in our opinion, the potential for use at the World Heritage site Lake Baikal.

The first set of issues, the generality of which attracts attention, concerns the boundaries of World Heritage sites and the procedure for determining them. As we have already pointed out in a publication specifically devoted to this issue, indeed, from a formal legal point of view, such uncertainty exists. It is caused by a number of shortcomings of the cartographic material, as well as the brevity of the conclusions of the IUCN and the decision of the World Heritage Committee to include Baikal in the World Heritage List ^{[26, p. 115]}.

Noting in this publication the application of a systematic approach to the analysis of the substantive positions of the World Heritage Committee, we have shown that at the level of international legal regulation, borders are established. The Committee has never spoken about the uncertainty of the boundaries of the object, on the contrary, in 2007, at its 31st session, it welcomed the combination of the boundaries of the Central Ecological Zone of the Baikal Natural Territory and the boundaries of the World Heritage Site ^[27]. At the same time, five cities are excluded from the territory of the World Heritage site: Baikalsk, Slyudyanka, Kultuk, Babushkin and Severobaikalsk (six settlements are indicated in the IUCN conclusion itself, however, it is obvious that this is a mistake, since Kyakhta, mentioned among the large settlements, is located in the south of the Republic of Buryatia at a considerable distance from Lake Baikal) ^[28]. However, in the internal Russian law there is no official normative fixing of the boundaries of the World Natural Heritage site Lake Baikal." In this regard, there were constant disputes about what its territory was. For our part, we proposed to consolidate in law the state of things that has developed in the international regulatory system. This is possible by fixing in the Federal Law "On the Protection of Lake Baikal" that its borders as a World Heritage site coincide with the borders of the CEZ BPT, with the exception of the five mentioned settlements.

In the framework of this publication, we would like to draw attention to the international legal regime of the territory occupied by these cities. With their territorial "invasion" of the borders of the World Heritage site, they are very similar to the situation that has developed in the Pirin National Park. As it was shown, two sites on the territory of which the infrastructure of ski resorts is located were removed from the territory of the World Heritage site and a buffer zone was formed due to them. The reason for this was the loss of these sites of qualities of outstanding universal value. At the same time, their initial and organic connectedness with the rest of the object predetermined the need to find some kind of international legal form of expression of such a connection. The recognition of these sites as a buffer zone has become such an international legal regime. At the same time, it should be noted that the provisions of the Guidelines do not contain precise criteria for classifying the territory as a buffer zone or as part of the World Heritage Site itself. Thus, Article 101 of the Guidelines stipulates that the boundaries of the actual object should cover the areas directly adjacent to the territory, which has an outstanding universal value, in order to protect the heritage object from the direct influence of anthropogenic factors and the harmful effects of human resource extraction activities carried out outside the nominated territory. For similar purposes, a buffer zone is created in accordance with Article 104 of the Manual. It provides that the buffer zone is the territory surrounding the nominated object, which has restrictions that create an additional level of protection of the object. It includes the immediate environment of the nominated object, important panoramas and other territories or attributes that are functionally significant for the support of the object and its protection. In other words, the immediately adjacent territories according to paragraph 101 (part of the World Heritage Site) can also be considered as the immediate environment of the object according to paragraph 104 (buffer zone of the object). That is why the analysis of the practice of applying the Convention by the World Heritage Committee is of paramount importance in understanding the role of buffer zones, in particular, and the specifics of defining and establishing the boundaries of World Heritage sites in general. The issue of buffer zones, of course, deserves to be the subject of independent research, so in this article we will limit ourselves to some general considerations on this score.

In 2008, the subject of buffer zones became the subject of an international expert meeting ^[29]. This document is interesting because it presents, among other things, the position of the advisory bodies of the Committee. By themselves, they do not have binding legal significance, but they help to identify problems in understanding this institution, and also reveal the existing approaches to the establishment of different regimes. Thus, in accordance with the position of the IUCN, the tasks of buffer zones may be the regulation of the scale and locations of tourist infrastructure (p. 51); support for sustainable use and benefits for communities (p. 55); implementation of additional protection of the object (p. 55). From the available materials of the Lake Baikal nomination and the conclusions of the advisory bodies, it is unclear whether the issue of establishing buffer zones was discussed (We emphasize that we are talking about the buffer zone of the World Heritage site as an international legal regime. The buffer zone of the Baikal Natural Territory has a purely intrastate nature and does not relate to the subject of this study). In any case, this issue is not reflected in the IUCN conclusion in any way, it only refers to the "core zone" (Note that the documents of the World Heritage protection system and the practice of the advisory bodies of the Committee for a long time did not show rigor in word usage, which caused and continues to cause confusion. Regarding the term "core zone", the Committee, in decision 32 COM 7.1, asked the World Heritage Center not to use this word combination, but to use the term "property". Along with the term "property", the term "site" is used. ICOMOS, which is an advisory body in relation to cultural heritage objects, noted in the cited report of the expert meeting (p. 33) the preference for using the term "property" over the term "site", since the latter is a kind of cultural heritage objects. In modern Russian reality, such inconsistency in the use of terms has given rise to the opinion that it is necessary to separate the concepts of "object" and "site" of World Heritage with the obvious purpose of weakening the environmental regime on Lake Baikal. This circumstance determines the need, on the one hand, to improve the terminology used in the world Heritage protection system, and increases the importance of a systematic analysis of the practice of world heritage protection expressed in the decisions of the Committee).

It seems to us that the practice of protecting the Pirin National Park demonstrates the fundamental possibility of discussing the extension of the World Heritage buffer zone regime to five cities excluded from the World Heritage site Lake Baikal. In modern conditions, the international legal regime for the protection of Lake Baikal has five "blind zones" - the territories of settlements that have been removed from the territory of the World Heritage site. Their "return" to the World Heritage protection system, even if not in the status of the territories of the World Heritage site, but in the status of buffer zones, will ensure its most important quality – integrity. Integrity, according to paragraph 88 of the Manual, is a measure of the unity and integrity of the natural heritage and its attributes. The extension of the buffer zone regime will help to create full compliance with the national embodiment of the World Heritage regime – the Central Ecological Zone of the Baikal Natural Territory, which includes these five settlements. This step can also contribute to the formation of a unified management of Lake Baikal as a World Heritage site. It seems that the term "surround" used in the Guide in relation to the buffer zone should not be an obstacle to a positive solution to this issue, since, as the example of the Pirin National Park shows, the buffer zone can, on the contrary, be "surrounded" by a World Heritage site.

Positive in the Bulgarian practice of nature protection is the establishment at the level of the law of the requirement for the preparation of management plans. The World Heritage Committee has repeatedly pointed out the need to prepare a general plan for the management of Lake Baikal as a World Heritage site, as well as specialized (functional) plans, for example, a plan to combat forest fires. Preparation of management plans is one of the most general and important requirements of the World Heritage protection system (paragraph 108 of the Manual). At the time of writing this article, there is no such plan for Lake Baikal. In our opinion, this state of affairs is predetermined by a number of systemic problems. The main reasons are the lack of unified principles for the management of the World Heritage site and the absence of any methodological guidelines for their preparation in the acts of domestic legislation. Baikal as a water body is the property of the Russian Federation; the corresponding territories adjacent to the water area are part of the Irkutsk Region and the Republic of Buryatia. Local self-government bodies operate on the territories of settlements, and the territories of special economic zones operate in a separate legal regime. In addition, specially protected natural areas are located within the boundaries of the CEZ BPT. With such a variety of legal regimes of activity and divergent interests (Indicative is the position of the Strategy for the development of domestic and inbound tourism in the Republic of Buryatia for the period up to 2035 : approved. By Order of the Government of the Republic of Belarus No. 714-r dated November 28, 2019 // Official Internet Portal of the Government of the Republic of Buryatia www.egov-buryatia.ru 2019. In this document, competition from the Irkutsk Region is directly indicated as a threat to the development of tourism in the Republic of Buryatia. The development of an agreed plan for regulating tourism activities in such conditions seems to be a difficult task to achieve), the formation of any general management plan is difficult. The solution of this issue is possible by granting the CEZ BPT the status of a specially protected natural area, which it is in fact, being the national embodiment of the World Heritage regime. Such recognition will make it possible to concentrate the management of the World Heritage site in one common administration of the CEZ BPT while preserving all existing specially protected natural areas, the management of which will also be consolidated in a single administration. In this sense, it will be an "umbrella" specially protected natural area (hereinafter also SPNA) sui generis, created on the basis of federal law. The implementation of such an approach will require amendments to the Federal Law "On Specially Protected Natural Territories", fixing the fact that certain types of protected areas can be created on the basis of federal law. Among the grounds for their creation, a significant extent in space and the presence of settlements within their boundaries can be fixed.

The creation of unified administrations of protected areas is already being implemented within the Baikal Natural Territory and corresponds to the general policy of consolidating the management of specially protected natural territories ^{[30, p. 96]}. The recognition of the BPT CEZ as a specially protected natural territory will not lead to additional restrictions on human activity, since this regime has already been formed by a Government Decree approving a list of activities prohibited within its borders (List of activities prohibited in the central ecological zone of the Baikal Natural Territory : approved. By Decree of the Government of the Russian Federation No. 2399 of December 31, 2020 // Collection of Legislation of the Russian Federation. 2021. No. 2. Part 2. Article 448).  The main purpose of recognizing it as a specially protected natural area is to create conditions for the implementation of a unified environmental and management policy within the World Heritage site Lake Baikal.

Another change in national legislation necessary to comprehensively reflect the specifics of World Heritage sites is the addition of the law on protected areas with a separate section "International legal environmental regimes", fixing the specifics of fulfilling international obligations under the World Heritage Convention, the Ramsar Convention, as well as within the framework of the "Man and the Biosphere" program (we cite the most famous international contracts, which does not mean that the content of this section cannot reflect the specifics of the implementation of other contracts). A specially protected natural area of a traditional type or sui generis should be created in the territories subject to international environmental regimes. The composition of such a territory should include the actual sites of world significance and their buffer zones, in connection with which it seems desirable to extend the buffer zone regime of the World Heritage site to five cities located in the CEZ of the BPT and not included in the territory of the World Heritage site.

One of the main provisions forming the content of this section should be the requirement to prepare at least one management plan for protected areas in accordance with the recommendations of relevant international bodies. In the Bulgarian Law, such a requirement, as has been shown, is established for all specially protected natural areas. We believe that at the initial stage, it is quite possible to assign the obligation of such plans only to protected areas, which are national forms of implementation of international legal protection regimes. This will, on the one hand, ensure the fulfillment of the international obligations of the Russian Federation and introduce advanced global approaches to the management and protection of unique and typical ecosystems. On the other hand, such an introduction of responsibilities for the preparation of management plans will allow you to gain experience in their preparation and avoid a stressful situation and a formal attitude to the preparation of plans as another paperwork that needs to be done "for show". The Bulgarian experience of preparing a temporary management plan is also useful. The territory of Lake Baikal as a World Heritage site, as it was shown, includes a large number of settlements, as well as zones with special conditions for doing business. Therefore, the preparation of a general management plan for the standards of world Heritage protection, as well as the development of special plans (for example, to manage the flow of tourists), will require considerable time. For the period of preparation, it is quite possible to adopt a temporary management plan, the efforts to develop which should also be undertaken by the unified administration of the Central Ecological Zone of the Baikal Natural Territory.

In connection with the issues under consideration of preparing management plans for Baikal as a World Heritage site, it is impossible not to note the special importance of strategic environmental assessment to ensure that environmental priorities are taken into account when forming a long-term management policy. As was shown by the example of the Pirin National Park, the World Heritage Committee expresses persistent requests to conduct such an assessment and take its results into account in the formation of management plans. Unfortunately, at the moment there is no regulatory framework for SEA in the Russian Federation. I think it is necessary to support the opinion of scientists who claim that the expression of consent to be bound by the Convention on Environmental Impact Assessment in a Transboundary Context (ESPOO Convention) and its Protocol on Strategic Environmental Assessment (Kiev Protocol) will serve as a powerful incentive for the formation of the SEA institute in Russian legislation ^{[31, p. 101]}. In turn, after the establishment of this institution in Russian legislation, the prepared plans for the management of World Heritage sites should also become its subject.

The recognition of the BPT CEZ as a specially protected natural area, the creation of its unified administration and the adoption of a management plan will allow the zoning of Lake Baikal as a World Heritage Site. To date, there is no such general zoning. Zoning for the organization of tourism and recreation is carried out by the Rules of tourism and Recreation in the Central Economic Zone of the BPT, approved separately by the Irkutsk region (Rules for the organization of tourism and recreation in the central ecological zone of the Baikal Natural territory in the Irkutsk region: approved. Post. The Government of the Irkutsk region from September 19. 2019 No. 777-pp // Official Internet portal of legal information of the Irkutsk region http://www.ogirk.ru . 2019) and the Republic of Buryatia (Rules for the organization of tourism and recreation in the Central ecological zone of the Baikal Natural Territory in the Republic of Buryatia: approved. Post. Government of the Republic of Buryatia dated August 1, 2019 No. 416 // Official Internet Portal of the Government of the Republic of Buryatia www.egov-buryatia.ru . 2019. At the same time, the rules approved by the Government of the Irkutsk region explicitly state that they are advisory in nature for protected areas of federal and local significance, as well as for a special economic zone of tourist and recreational type located in the CEZ BPT (paragraph 5). Such a decision only confirms the fragmentation of the legal regime in the CEZ BPT).

The Bulgarian experience in increasing the role of scientific expertise in decision-making on nature protection issues also deserves attention. As noted, the approval of national park management plans passes through the expert Council, and a Scientific Advisory Council has also been established in Pirin National Park for scientific expertise. Scientific expertise of the problems of the Baikal natural territory is provided by the Scientific Council of the SB RAS on the problems of Lake Baikal. He is actively engaged in providing scientific expertise of existing problems and management decisions ^[32]. At the same time, we believe that the role of the Scientific Council can be strengthened by fixing the obligation to obtain the opinion of the Council on a number of the most important issues. These should include the zoning of territories within the BPT CEZ (including the creation of new special economic zones); amendments to the List of Activities prohibited for sale on Lake Baikal; the construction of linear structures on the territory of the BPT CEZ and other most important issues of nature protection. Of course, scientists should not replace officials, and such a conclusion in itself cannot be an obstacle to making a managerial decision. However, the obligation to request such an opinion before making a decision, its public preparation and publication of the text of the conclusion in the mass media will avoid making behind-the-scenes decisions and improve the quality of decisions made.