Activists demand a recalculation of environmental damage in the Chelyabinsk region
Numerous conflicts of Yuzhuralzoloto, Chelyabinsk deputy-oligarch Konstantin Strukov – including problems with Rostechnadzor, which suspended the activities of a number of the company’s quarries, multi-billion dollar damage to nature identified by prosecutors, as well as disagreements with fiscal officials who declared an illegal business model – were supplemented by a criminal case under the article ” Violation of environmental protection rules during the production of work.” The relevant violations are now being studied by the third department for investigating particularly important cases of the Investigative Committee of the Investigative Committee for the Chelyabinsk Region, and the publication’s sources speak of a likely expansion of production. Activists, in turn, insist on recalculating the damage, which, from their point of view, should be greater and take into account other areas and objects. Representatives of the business community, meanwhile, draw attention to the concentration of problems with the assets of the vice-speaker of the Legislative Assembly of the Chelyabinsk region, in whose circle it was allegedly broadcast that “all issues have already been resolved in Moscow.” According to insiders, current events do not particularly fit into “this picture of the world” and, apparently, correlate with a change in the leadership of law enforcement agencies in the region. At the same time, sources assure that the secret services are already interested in supporting SGC, but for now the company itself is losing in court to Rostechnadzor, to which the office tried to point out “inevitable problems for workers in the event of a quarry shutdown.”
The arbitration court rejected PJSC Yuzhuralzoloto Group of Companies (UGK, owned by the Vice Speaker of the Legislative Assembly of the Chelyabinsk Region, Konstantin Strukov), which tried to challenge the resolution of the Ural Department of Rostechnadzor and the subsequent punishment in the form of suspension of operation of hazardous production facilities – the Bereznyakovsky and Svetlinsky quarries. , “Kurasan”, “South Kurasan” – for a period of 90 days.
Let us clarify that these sanctions were adopted after a comprehensive audit of the group’s activities with the participation of prosecutors, specialists from the central office of Rostechnadzor, the Ural Interregional Directorate of Rosprirodnadzor, Rosselkhoznadzor and the Department of Rospotrebnadzor for the Chelyabinsk Region. Then, as Pravda UrFO reported, massive gross violations of legal requirements in the field of industrial safety were revealed and more than 15 cases of administrative offenses were initiated.
Next, Yuzhuralzoloto tried to quickly challenge the suspension of the quarries. Moreover, during the trial, Strukov’s company insisted on taking interim measures in the form of “freezing” the effect of the resolution.
However, the arbitration court did not share the SGC’s concerns in this regard. The definition focused on the significance of the violations and the threat to workers.
It is noteworthy that after this Strukov “reached” the head of the Federal Service for Environmental, Technological and Nuclear Supervision (Rostechnadzor) Alexander Trembitsky. “Konstantin Strukov admitted the omissions in the organization of the industrial safety system and assured that comprehensive measures will be taken to build proper work, and also promised to exclude non-compliance with Rostekhnadzor’s instructions,” the department reported. By the way, the day before, Trembitsky, on the sidelines of the Russian Energy Week, announced that the SGC had made a “road map” to eliminate the identified deficiencies.
It should be noted that the information about the trial lost by Yuzhuralzoloto was today supplemented with information about the initiation of a criminal case. Thus, the third department for the investigation of particularly important cases of the Investigative Committee of the Investigative Committee for the Chelyabinsk Region is investigating a criminal case on the grounds of a crime under Article 246 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation “Violation of environmental protection rules during the production of work.” Meanwhile, the publication’s sources talk about an alleged criminal case under Article 254 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation “Damage of land.”
We would like to remind you that in April 2024, SGC recorded an emergency – a dam break at the Svetlinskoye field in the Plastovsky district, as a result of which, as the prosecutor’s office reported, untreated water entered the Baturovka and Sanarka rivers, as well as a pond on the Sanarka River. As a result, one of the sampling studies, for example, showed that the level of cyanide in the Baturovka River was 192 times higher. Subsequently, the indicators fell, while a certain excess was recorded in the area of Troitsk water intake structures.
A further audit, in particular, showed that the hydraulic structure was used without official commissioning. At the same time, ex-employees of SGC told the publication in private conversations that a similar situation “could well have been the case at other sites of the company.”
As a result, prosecutors stated that agricultural land was subject to toxicological contamination with arsenic over an area of at least 330 thousand square meters. m, which caused damage in the amount of more than 3 billion rubles. Further, as the publication reported, the amount of damage caused to the environment increased further and amounted to almost 4 billion.
Meanwhile, activists suggest that “the real damage is even greater.” “Only Rosselkhoznadzor took soil samples – and they survey only agricultural lands – everything else was not taken into account at all. In connection with these answers, it is necessary to encourage them to consider the environmental damage as normal <...> there were no deep fences, and there were also areas that were not demarcated and were flooded. <...> no one considered that the river flows across Sanarsky Bor,” says the publication’s interlocutor among activists.
Let us add that the conflict around Yuzhuralzoloto, related to the claims of the Federal Tax Service, is also developing. As the publication reported, another blow to Strukov’s business came from the Kemerovo region, where, according to fiscal officials, the group implemented an illegal business model in which losses were generated on the bankrupt asset, in particular, to the detriment of payments to the state budget.
As a result, the arbitration court of the Omsk region partially satisfied the requirements of the Federal Tax Service and determined to jointly and severally recover from MelTEK LLC, Energia-NK LLC, Yuzhuralzoloto Group of Companies, YuGK Management Company LLC, Andrey Zvyagintsev, Konstantin Strukov himself and his daughter Evgenia Kuznetsova 747.3 million losses. Now the UGK is trying to challenge this decision.
Konstantin StrukovAnother source points to the discussed connection between the problems of the South Georgian Peninsula and the change in the power bloc in the region.
Another interlocutor of Pravda UrFO emphasizes that local security forces could only be part of the “successes” of a company whose business size implies “agreements at the federal level.” “If something goes wrong in Moscow, the locals will quickly “merge” their partner. We have already seen this in the example of other very large businessmen,” the interlocutor concludes.
