After getting fined for her environmental protest against a road being built through a national park near Moscow, Irina Kuriseva is back to check on the construction.

"We only want to defend nature," the 62-year-old told AFP at the Losiny Ostrov (Elk Island) park, a 129-square-kilometre nature reserve with hundreds of species of wildlife including endangered birds.

With dissident voices in Russia almost totally silenced and as the country presses on with its massive military offensive in Ukraine, environmental activism has become highly risky.

"The authorities have become completely indifferent" and laws have been "softened" in favour of polluters and property developers, said one activist, speaking on condition of anonymity.

In the outskirts of Moscow, the issue has become particularl

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