"Who does not leave, he will die"

The territory of environmental protests in the north of Russia is growing. Already the inhabitants of the Veps villages in Karelia rebelled against the construction of gravel quarries on Onega

In the Prionezhsky district, for nothing, which is 100 km from the republican capital, it is not easy to get: the road is so defeated so that it is simply difficult to call it in some places. Taisiya Semenovna says: everyone has long been accustomed to accidents involving rare buses. She herself ended up in such an accident, since then she almost does not see one eye.

Taisiya Semenovna returned to the Prionezhie, old. In the grandfather’s house in the village with a difficult -pronounced name of Kascuesruchi. So large that we somehow managed to place 35 Finnish scientists who came to the explorers who came to explore Russian Karelia there. Cascesses are the most environmentally friendly point on the map of the republic. Therefore, the plans to open a quarry 200 meters from her house Taisiya Semenovna actively opposed. Like almost the entire population of the district. In the villages of Cascleschers, another river, fishing, and in the neighboring Sheltozersky settlement, people, barely hearing that next year nine quarries for the extraction of diabazes and gravel would appear around them at once, decided to stand to the end. Because there are already seven active quarries there.

Vepses live in the Prionezhie-the indigenous Finno-Ugric people. There are five thousand left in the world. The same part is in Karelia. In the 90s there was a national autonomy-a Veps volost. Then writing was recreated, dictionaries were published. When it came to its own coat of arms and programs of socio-economic development, the volost was eliminated-as part of the municipal reform of the early 2000s.

Now, in order to prove the right to the benefits of the indigenous people, local residents must sue, each separately.

“I just heard that the laws were granted to us, but I have never seen someone received them,” says Elena Timbaeva, a municipal deputy of the Ryboretsky rural settlement.

Lena first went into politics in the last municipal elections. When the head of the settlement announced to people about the plans of the Ministry of Natural Resources of the republic to open nine new quarries in the settlement, Timbaeva sent the appeal to the leader of Yabloko Emilia Slabunova and the regional authorized person for human rights. When Slabunova raised this issue at a meeting of the Republican Legislative Assembly, the representative of the Ministry of Natural Resources replied that we were not talking about any industrial development. Bye.

The fishing careers are surrounded by a half -ring. On the one hand, crushed stone is extracted, on the other - diabase. During explosive work, the dishes ring the rustic on the tables. The car left in the yard at night by morning is covered with a layer of gray dust.

Lena says wild animals were reached in the villages, which were supplanted by industrialists. Bears, wolves, foxes. Even snakes crawled from their homes - closer to housing.

- The forest on the site of future quarries began to cut down last year. They said that these were some kind of research, environmental investigations, ”says Elena. - And on June 5, the head of the settlement gathered us on public hearings, said that the Ministry of Natural Resources asks us to vote for the opening of nine quarries. We will vote - they will be able to put up plots for auctions. People voted against. But we did not see the protocol. At my request to give it a refusal. And no one stopped deforestation.

Then the inhabitants of the settlement decided to record a video message to Putin and send to a “direct line”. At the appointed hour, the police came to the audience. According to the district police officer, a signal of the unauthorized rally came from the head of the district. However, the police were also local - having figured out and delved into, she left.

- From our village of Casclesers to quarries nine kilometers. But when the wind is on the other side, we feel the dust in the air. And how will we feel it when the quarry will open 600 meters from us? - Asks a man on a video message.

- We are sick, children get sick, allergies, pulmonary diseases. Do they want to kill us? From Cascess to Sheltozer, there will be a quarry on every kilometer. How do we live here?

We are told that jobs will be. And so we are all employed, we no longer need! - People say one by one, hoping that the supreme power will hear.

But the appeal of the Vepses did not enter the air of the “direct line”. As, however, questions about a landfill on Shiies from the neighboring Arkhangelsk region. Meanwhile, a wave of environmental protests is always covered by a calm Russian north.

People who are accustomed to endure refuse to give the last - their rivers, lakes and swamps. People from the outskirts, accustomed to living autonomously from power, are not ready to allow this power to deprive them of their right to life. People whose ancestors did not know serfdom are not going to retreat. Three days after the protests in the Prionezhie, the Segezhsky district stood - there, on the shore of Vygozer, they are going to open an inter -municipal landfill.

People in Ryboretskoy, too, only at first glance stand in their three or four villages. In fact - for the whole north. For dust reduction, the breed in the quarries is irrigated with water. It flows, ultimately, in the Onega Lake, the second largest freshwater reservoir in Europe, which already feels a tremendous load on the ecosystem, annually receiving more than 300 million cubic meters of technogenic drains from enterprises and communal systems of Karelia.

-At the 105th kilometer, all the washing from the quarry go to the stream, and then to the Onega Lake, to our most catchy bay. There is already a stain on the water for several hundred meters, ”says one of the men on a video message.

Anatoly Klimov, the chairman of the local council of veterans, confirms: the drains are organized directly to the lake, on an industrial scale. Whether it will still be. The former investigator, Klimov has already studied the “scene of the incident” - went through the territory that they want to allocate under his careers. The forest there for several hectares is cut out of clean. Not like foresters or foresters chopped. And this means that the good has actually issued the good for the arrangement of quarries, otherwise the investor would not have received permission to cutting and would not spend money.

“I was engaged in careers - I know how this is done,” says Anatoly Alexandrovich. - First you go to the head of the district, negotiate, he puts a signature, then to the foresters - they allow you to bring down. You calculate the forest.

But no one would bring down without permission. Try the log tree in the forest - they will immediately be fined. And then they are felled with hectares. So, they have someone’s signature, which means that the decision is made.

From the windows of the house of Elena Timbaeva, you are visible without any binoculars. The dumps from mining are almost 90% of the entire processed mass. The output of the commodity unit is only 5-10%. The mountains of the unnecessary slag gradually surround the villages and advance on Onega. The lake is also visible from the window. Only not to approach him anymore. The shores are cut off from roads by barriers and guard boards. Behind them are the berths where the stone is loaded with barges.

The stone is taken out by barges and dump trucks. Warning signs “Belazes work” - here and there. Cars finally break the road, cutting off the fishing from the world.

Taisiya Ageeva is tied to Ryboretsky roots - literally. A few years ago, it compiled a genealogical tree, which goes into history until 1700. All generations lived in these parts.

- If these careers open, our villages will die. Everyone will leave, who can. And whoever will not be able to die, ”says Taisiya Semenovna. - I, apparently, will have to leave.

Elena Tumbayeva says that for the first time she began to lock the door of the house - it was not accepted before. And now it’s scary for myself and for the daughter. Lena recently began to come strange messages from strangers: they are not threatened yet, but they are already making it clear that Timbaev, let’s say, noticed. And they remembered.

- Lord, what am I fighting for? She says, somehow completely sad and tired.

“You are fighting for your grandchildren,” Sasha that appeared in the courtyard reports authoritatively.

Two days after our conversation, Alexei Shchepin, Minister of Natural Resources of the Republic of Karelia, arrived in Ryboretskoye. He stated that the work on applications for nine quarries are suspended - taking into account the opinions of the local population. Did people believe the authorities? Not good. Suspended - does not mean prohibited. And no one will restore the cut forest.

Meanwhile, it became known that a little further in the Prionezhsky district, a garbage training ground with a capacity of 250 thousand tons per year will be built in the town of Orzeg. People are preparing for protests.