Residents of Bashkortostan ask to recognize the Irendik ridge with a specially protected natural area in order to protect it from the development of rare metals

Officials promise to consider the issue, but people do not trust them and are afraid that Irendik will become “New Kushtau”

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Residents of Bashkortostan are asking to assign the Irandik ridge the status of a specially protected natural territory (protected areas) to protect it from the development of rare metals. They sent an appropriate appeal to the Federation Council and the State Duma.

The ridge has a unique ecosystem, the circulation says. It houses monuments of archeology, places of worship and pasture, as well as Lake Talkas, which already has the status of protected areas.

The Ministry of Natural Resources and Rosnedra issued permission to conduct survey work on the ridge. In the spring of 2023, manganese ores began to be sought there: providing Russian metallurgy with domestic manganese materials - one of the points of import substitution of the Ministry of Industry and Trade of Russia. Then people met geologists to many thousands of popular gathering.

After almost a year, in February 2024, on the initiative of the head of the Republic of Radiy Khabirov, exploration and development of subsoil was banned on the ridge, and the local Ministry of Natural Resources said that it would begin to consider the issue of recognizing the ridge Irandik with a specially protected natural area. Nevertheless, people do not trust local officials and are afraid that the ridge will be turned into a “new kuzhtau”. Therefore, now they turned to the federal authorities.

The fears of local residents are not groundless: earlier gold miners were interested in the Irendik ridge. It was here in 1992 that the Iredyk Bear nuggets weighed 4 kg of 788. And before that, the Semenovsky Gold -In -Development Factory worked for almost a century, after the closure of which there was a 40 hectare tail with 485 thousand m means with a mercury harmful to the health of people and animals, arsenic and pig.

Locals have already tried to defend Irendyk. One of the eco -defenders, the Bashkir eco -activist Fail Alsynov, a few months after the popular gathering against gold mining was sentenced to four years in prison for the speech that he made in the Bashkir language. The verdict provoked mass protests in the Baymak district of the republic, about 10 thousand people participated in them. After rallies in Baymak, a case of “mass riots” was opened, 78 people were already arrested , the investigation is ongoing.