OREANDA-NEWS. March 24, 2008. In Zaporozhye a new round of raider attacks has started. Again the target is gully Srednyaya, which is part of production of the following enterprises: Zaporizhstal JSC, “Dneprospetsstal” (DSS) and “Zaporozhye Ferro Alloys Plant”. The management and collectives of these city enterprises have combined their efforts in their fight with the illegal measures of the raiders. A press-conference was dedicated to this subject, participants of which were the 1st Deputy Chairman of the Board of our Works, Technical Director, A.Yu. Putnoki, Financial Director, A.I. Rabtsun, and also the management of Dneprospetstal JSC and Zaporozhye Ferro Alloy Plant. The prehistory of these events are the following: in July last year 2 deputies of the regional council addressed an appeal to the Cabinet of Ministers with an urgent request to “establish order” in gully Srednyaya and return it to its “legal license holders”: “Dea Roma” and “Massa-Invest”, firms with a criminal background, were engaged in pseudo export in the field of collecting and processing metal scrap. The Zaporozhye economic court in a strange manner restored the validity of their license on the right to use the land. Collectives of Zaporozhye metallurgical enterprises were outraged with such actions of the court authorities and appealed to the Prime-Minister and the President with a request not to allow lawless actions.

The goal of the press-conference, which was held in the conference hall of the Dneprospetsstal JSC management, was to inform the public, that gully Srednyaya is an integral part of the technological cycle of the above mentioned metallurgical enterprises of the city, which work there in correspondence with the state ecological requirements. In his speech the Chairman of the Board of Dneprospetsstal, Daniel Valk, called the events, which previously took place in gully Srednyaya, real lawlessness. He noted that the previous gully development engineers brought great ecological harm to the territory. The enterprise had to additionally invest approximately 10 million UAH to bring everything into order. At present DSS is developing the gully at full capacity. It is part of production.

A.I. Rabtsun, Financial Director of Zaporizhstal JSC, on behalf of the deputies of the regional council, held a speech at the press-conference. All the enterprises, stated A.I. Rabtsun, have an act on the right of ownership of the gully land. On this land workshops have been built, people and machinery are working. The land is guarded by a state safeguard service of the Ministry of Internal Affairs. There is no criminal situation there. There are also permits signed by the regional environmental inspectorate. They guarantee that all the ecological instructions are followed. Enterprises invest money in the improvement of the ecological situation in the gully: trench Nagornaya and the near-bank Dnieper River area have been cleaned, a drainage water circulation system returning the water to the industrial closed recycling system has been established. Everything said by other deputies, who defend the interests of the raiders, is only a screen to hide its intentions. Moreover, these intentions are very simple, i.e. to earn black money. The raiders are going to earn money not on mythic supplies of valuable metal, which don’t even exist. In this case another scheme works, i.e. penetration into the enterprise production process, which will allow stealing of finished metal. This is great illegal business.

The 1st Deputy Chairman of the Board, Technical Director of Zaporizhstal JSC, Alexander Yu. Putnoki, stated that this year the Works will introduce a system for processing slag. This will lead to the fact that a large part of iron containing raw material will be extracted and used in production, and the remains will be sold to enterprises of the building industry. Monitoring, regularly done by Zaporizhstal, certifies that deterioration of the ecological situation in gully Srednyaya has not been noticed. It is unlikely that the new owners will find money to solve ecological problems. Namely their actions will lead to a catastrophe.

One of the demands of the raiders is to recognize gully Srednyaya as a technogenic deposit. But that is not so because this is mining waste. Metallurgical waste is included in the force of law “On waste” and belongs to the enterprises, which is confirmed by corresponding documents.

A result of the press-conference is the adoption of a new appeal to the Prime-Minister and the President of Ukraine with an urgent request to put things right regarding the situation around the technical waste ground “Gully Srednyaya”. It’s still not known what the end of the conflict will be. Is there any hope that a new round will start?