Translated material
Letting go of waste
Director of PA "Mayak" reinstated
The head of the Federal Atomic Energy Agency, Sergei Kiriyenko, put an end to the year-and-a-half conflict between the director of the Chelyabinsk chemical plant "Mayak" subordinate to him and the department of the Prosecutor General's Office in the Ural Federal District. Arriving in Yekaterinburg on Monday, Mr. Kiriyenko announced the reinstatement of Vitaly Sadovnikov, head of Mayak Production Association. Problems with the director of the largest radioactive waste processing plant arose in January last year - at a board meeting in his department, Prosecutor General of Russia Vladimir Ustinov spoke about facts of environmental pollution in the Chelyabinsk region. Within days of this, a department of the Prosecutor General's Office began an investigation and found evidence that from 2001 to 2004, Mayak's management allowed tens of millions of cubic meters of liquid radioactive waste to be dumped into the neighboring Techa River.Vitaly Sadovnikov and the regional leadership consider the source of the problems to be the notorious accident at the plant almost half a century ago, the environmental consequences of which can only be overcome with financial support from the federal center. But the Ural representative office of the Prosecutor General's Office saw only Mr. Sadovnikov as guilty, against whom a criminal case was initiated under Articles 246 (“Violation of environmental protection rules during the production of work”) and 247 of the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation (“Violation of rules for the circulation of environmentally hazardous substances and waste”). . The investigation lasted more than a year and ended with a court decision allowing the investigation of a criminal case against deputy of the regional legislative assembly Vitaly Sadovnikov. The intercession of Chelyabinsk Governor Pyotr Sumin did not help either, who, during a visit to the region by the head of the Federal Atomic Energy Agency, Sergei Kiriyenko, tried to gain the support of the loyal director. But the guest took a position of neutrality and, before talking with the governor, met with Deputy Prosecutor General Yuri Zolotov. As a result, after Mr. Kiriyenko’s departure, both regional authorities and investigators spoke of the support of their actions by the head of the Federal Agency.
Moreover, it was the prosecutors who were actually right: soon Sergei Kiriyenko signed an order to remove Mr. Sadovnikov from office. In April, the court began considering the criminal case, and immediately after the May holidays, it granted amnesty to the director of Mayak in connection with the 100th anniversary of the Russian State Duma. The basis was the age of the accused (60 years) and the fact that the charges brought against him were of moderate gravity. Mr. Sadovnikov's recognizance was removed, and on May 25 he appeared in the legislative assembly, where he was re-elected in December. At the meeting, the noticeably thinner deputy was keenly interested in the rules for increasing wages for public sector employees in municipalities.
Now Vitaly Sadovnikov has been restored to his position. Sergei Kiriyenko, who arrived in Yekaterinburg yesterday, said that he made a decision based on the court verdict. “There are no obstacles to the director’s work,” said the head of the Federal Agency, who is scheduled to appear at Mayak today. At the same time, the district prosecutor's office has already filed a protest against the regional court's decision to grant amnesty to the accused. Employees of the supervisory authority believe that the amnesty was carried out illegally: Vitaly Sadovnikov signed two mutually exclusive petitions to apply an amnesty to him and to send the case for additional investigation. However, the lawyer of the director of the chemical plant, Gennady Likhachev, assures that the complaint from the prosecutor’s office will not change the court’s verdict and concerns a private ruling issued to the prosecutor’s office. The verdict itself to terminate the criminal case came into force on May 21, and the prosecutor’s office does not challenge it.