Saving the trees

摘要

DAWN in Bialowieza forest, and the bellowing of deer in rut competes with the buzz of chainsaws. The rival rackets sum up an increasingly ill-tempered argument over the Polish half of the ancient woods that straddle the frontier between Poland and Belarus. The row has reverberated beyond the forest's borders, and indeed beyond Poland's. It pits competing visions of environmental stewardship and economic development, and of Poland's path under the right-wing Law and Justice (pis) party.