LAW AT WORK AND NOT

After Sochi was proclaimed the 2014 Olympics host last week, the local administration sought to reassure residents.

Alexei Khraban, who is in charge of Olympic preparations in the mayor's office, said whatever happened in the area would be done in accordance with Russian law.

"No one will be forced out or have anything taken away," he told a press conference.

But laws in Russia can change quickly, with parliament rubber-stamping presidential proposals, and corruption is widespread. Property rights are a grey area in Russia, and few believe they will be protected.

"We live in an unstable country. We don't know what to expect," said local Old Believer Lyuba Logareva.

A major problem is that most Novoimeretinskaya Bukhta residents do not have documents showing that they own their property. Those trying to register their land face Russia's notorious red tape and protracted delays.

"If the law says it is our property it will be harder to talk to us from a position of force, so we are trying to make it legal," said local resident Alexander Koval.

The local authorities had until recently been discouraging people from legalising their property, saying there is an unwritten moratorium on Novoimeretinskaya Bukhta, Korutun adds.

Korutun says Old Believers are not against holding the Olympics in the Sochi area.

But he added: "If you move these old people out of here they are going to die. It is like a tree - if you take up its roots it dies."

1

2