Translated material
"Let them burn us too." Protests against mass destruction of livestock in Siberia continue
In the Novosibirsk region, farmers are protesting against the mass slaughter of livestock. The authorities explain this by dangerous diseases and the threat of an epidemic. Farmers say they are not even shown documents justifying the destruction of their animals. In some villages, people organized resistance - they did not let the equipment and veterinary services come to pick up the animals. Security forces were involved in the raids.
Since the beginning of March, social networks have been filled with videos filmed in villages and villages of the Novosibirsk region: bulldozers raking up cows lying on the ground to throw them into the back of a truck, other cattle are being driven in to give a lethal injection.
"Do you have a heart?" – a trembling female voice asks off-screen. The smartphone camera follows two men dressed in white overalls. “We don’t have a heart,” one of them calmly answers and moves on. “You are terrible people...” - a woman behind the scenes cries bitterly, filming how a seemingly healthy young cow is thrown into the snow and killed.
This is the village of Gnedukhino, Bagansky district of the Novosibirsk region. According to a local resident who posted a video on VKontakte, all animals were taken away from the village to be destroyed.
“The whole village was burned out, cows, sheep, pigs. Only 18 cattle were taken from a neighbor,” she says ( we do not indicate the names of the interlocutors for their safety).
The interlocutor Sibir.Realii did not keep her animals. And for distributing the video, she said, she has already “received a warning” from the authorities.
On March 7, the Ministry of Agriculture of the Novosibirsk Region confirmed to the state news agency that “animals are being confiscated and destroyed from citizens.” “Citizens will be paid compensation without fail,” the agency’s interlocutor assured. This is 170 rubles per kilogram of live weight, local media wrote. That is, for a cow weighing 500-600 kg, the owner will receive about 85-102 thousand rubles, while a new healthy dairy cow on the market often costs more than 150 thousand rubles, and a heifer - about 200-300 thousand.
No one has yet named the exact reason for the mass killing of animals. The authorities refer to the governor’s order No. 124-DSP of March 6, 2026, but it has not been published in the public domain, as required by law.
Since the beginning of 2026, 50 “unfavorable points for rabies” have been registered in the region, all points are in quarantine mode, reports the Novosibirsk Ministry of Agriculture. At the same time, in Kozikha, Novoklyucham, Lukoshino, Novopichugovo, Gnedukhino and Kalinovka, people were informed about outbreaks of pasteurellosis. It is a bacterial infectious disease that experts say can be treated with antibiotics and does not require the wholesale destruction of animals, like African swine fever, foot-and-mouth disease or rabies.
After massive complaints, the Investigative Committee began checking the actions of Ministry of Agriculture officials.
"Organized sabotage is underway"
On March 9-10, residents of the village of Kozikha, Ordynsky district, blocked the road for workers who had come to dig a cattle burial ground. The village has been in quarantine since March 6 - the roads are dug up by equipment. People also did not allow veterinary service employees who were going to pick up livestock to enter their yards.
“About 10 people in Kozikha alone received summonses for not allowing our livestock and our wet nurses to be burned,” says Sibir.Realii Daria from the village of Kozikha. – On March 9, the head of the district met with us, our activists had difficulty obtaining documents, and it turned out that all their demands (to give up livestock for destruction) were illegal - it didn’t even indicate what disease they suspected! The collective decision was signed by one governor, Travnikov (Andrei Travnikov, governor of the Novosibirsk region) , but, firstly, according to the law, he cannot single-handedly adopt such a resolution, and secondly, there is not even a transcript of his only surname. Where is the health doctor's order? They tell us verbally about pasteurellosis, but in reality they behave as if it were foot and mouth disease. Because pasteurellosis is easy to treat. So why not tell the truth if everything is serious?! Therefore, we are sure that they are lying to us about a “dangerous disease.” Where are the blood and milk tests? No.
On March 11, residents of Novopichugovo blocked the roads so as not to let Kamaz trucks come to pick up 40 euthanized cows from the local Sibirsky Kolos farm. The police arrived, altercations broke out, and three people were eventually detained.
– On March 11, Larisa from Kozikha was detained (Larisa Vyunnikova, a deputy of the Kozikha village council, she became ill after the arrest) , and she was sentenced to two days of arrest! According to the article on illegal rallies (20.2.2 of the Code of Administrative Offenses), says Sibir.Realii resident Svetlana . – Two more of ours from Novopichugino (Andrei Gavrilenko and Maxim Vil from Novopichugino were detained on March 11, Gavrilenko was sentenced to 2 days of arrest under the article about an illegal rally, reports were drawn up against Vil about an illegal rally and disobedience to the police - SR) not only was the illegal rally sealed, but also disobedience to the police. And we were just trying to get documents when they came to slaughter the cattle. And they arrived immediately with the police! That is, they knew that people would protest. How can one not protest against such lawlessness - they occupied us in such a way that entry and exit are subject to registration, even an ambulance cannot reach the sick, the other day a car going to a call circled around Kozikha and drove back. Without any legal decisions based on analysis, they decided to kill the cattle. All this was kept secret, the papers were not shown to us under the pretext that they were “for official use,” but the head of the district told Vyunnikova the truth: “They are not ready yet.” And for our livestock they promise us an unfortunate 171 rubles per kilogram of selected meat. Have you seen the prices in the stores here? 700 rubles per kilo is the minimum. In butcher shops, beef costs 1,500 rubles per kilo. And farm meat is precisely what is valued at the top [price] line.
On March 12, veterinary services came to the village of Novoklyuchi, accompanied by security forces, to euthanize the animals; a local resident who filmed what was happening was detained. The next day, one of the village residents was accused of setting fire to a farm where the corpses of killed animals were taken.
“They set up checkpoints at the entrance and exit, and they kill livestock every day,” says Ilya from Novoklyuchey. – White coat officers (veterinarians) arrive immediately with the police. Police cordon off a house where the owners keep livestock. Then they weigh the cattle and take them away to burn. At first they even burned it carelessly - the meat simply smoldered and stank.
To protect themselves and their animals, residents of Kozikha released a video message to the President of Russia on March 6.
“We ask you not to leave us in trouble. We ask you to help us save our farm, our cows, which are currently healthy. Neither blood nor milk were taken from our cows for analysis. All the cows in our farmsteads are healthy and active. We eat and drink products from our cows. We ask you to look into this situation. There is organized sabotage,” people say in the video.
In another, more detailed video , residents of Kozikha tell what is happening in the village.
“They said that our cattle are sick with a dangerous disease. We don’t know what kind of disease it is, they didn’t explain it to us. But in every farmstead people say the same thing: the cattle are healthy, eating, drinking, active. We have video from our cattle drives, all the animals are healthy. But they set restrictions for us: they left one entrance from the village, the rest of the exits were blocked, covered with snow. We ask for help, we ask to solve this problem. We will not let anyone take it. We won’t let healthy cows be burned or removed.
Do blood tests, milk tests - we are not against it. Let them come to us, or let’s organize an independent examination to take these tests. Nothing was processed: no roads, no barns, absolutely nothing. We are simply being destroyed in our native place,” say the villagers.
People explain: there is no other work in the village. Cows not only supply farms with milk, cottage cheese, and sour cream, but also allow them to earn money to pay for gas and electricity, buy medicines and manufactured goods, and pay for children’s education. Farmers insist all livestock are healthy. “Nice, healthy cows. They just calved recently,” they say.
“We won’t let anyone in. Even if they don’t try. Only through us. Then burn us along with the cows, since, in your opinion, the cows will infect us like that. We have nothing to lose. Let them burn us too. Where should we go? If they come to remove our livestock, only through our corpse. Let them kill us. What is death for us, what is death,” farmers say in one of the videos. The people in the frame are mostly women in their fifties.
In Kozikha, as one of the local residents told Sibir.Realii, there are now about 350 cows. People have not yet allowed any of them to be taken for slaughter.
"We defend ourselves as best we can"
According to Sibir.Realii's interlocutors, residents of the villages of Novoklyuchi and Lukoshino in the same Ordynsky district also set up equipment to prevent the seizure and destruction of livestock. And in other areas of the Novosibirsk region, where residents did not resist, there was a massive burning of livestock.
– We called back from Maslyaninsky, Cherepanovsky, Bagansky, Kupinsky. Harness [seized livestock], creatures. Tourniquet at night. Each cattle burial ground holds 600 carcasses per night. In the Karasuk district too,” says Daria. – It’s the same in the Altai Territory, the Penza Region. There, one farmer scored only 128 goals. We have 350 heads for the whole of Kozikha. But we also have fewer inhabitants, 500. And almost everyone keeps them. And such a slaughter, when we cannot even buy calves with compensation, will destroy us. They are not only cows, they are leading us to slaughter.
“Who needs this? Someone benefits. Someone needs to sell their meat. What else can you say? Nothing,” say the residents of Kozikha in their video. A variety of conspiracy theories are spreading on social networks: that “this is sabotage” and not the fight against the disease. Many people write that the destruction of cows on private farms is beneficial to large agricultural producers. Some suspect that the expansion of the Miratorg company is beginning, the real owner of which popular rumor has long called Dmitry Medvedev (both of these statements are not confirmed by anything), others blame local giant manufacturers.
So, approximately 7.5 km from Kozikha and 9.2-13.4 km from Novopichugovo is the village of Verkh-Irmen. It is home to one of the most famous and largest dairy complexes in the Novosibirsk region - “Irmen”, which has almost 11 thousand heads of cattle. This is a breeding farm: the basis of the herd is the black-and-white breed of its own selection, Irmenskaya, which is distinguished by its unpretentiousness and high productivity.
Irmeni dairy products are well known in the region. Local veterinary services do not touch their animals. The company issued a press release in response to "customer questions."
“We inform you that quarantine was not introduced at the Irmen breeding farm CJSC. In accordance with the legislation of the Russian Federation, restrictive measures are established exclusively by the decision of government authorities. No such decisions were made regarding our farm,” the statement says. – “The enterprise’s activities are carried out as usual. All necessary production and veterinary measures are carried out in the prescribed manner... exclusively planned preventive sanitary measures are carried out on the territory in order to prevent the spread of contagious animal diseases.”
The secrecy maintained by the authorities provokes rumors - people suspect that a more dangerous disease, such as foot and mouth disease, is spreading in the region. During an epidemic of foot and mouth disease, mass slaughter of animals is really required. But foot and mouth disease is not even mentioned in the official certificate about the epizootic situation in the Novosibirsk region. There is a mention of pasteurellosis: “As of March 12, 2026, the Novosibirsk region, in accordance with the Decision of the Federal Service for Veterinary and Phytosanitary Surveillance, has the regionalization status of “Region with an uncertain status, with vaccination” for pasteurellosis.”
Since the end of 2025, outbreaks of pasteurellosis have been recorded in Buryatia, the Altai Republic, Transbaikalia and the Altai Territory.
Pasteurellosis is a bacterial infection of cattle, which can occur both acutely (with high mortality) and latently: animals often remain asymptomatic carriers, therefore, when an outbreak is confirmed, veterinary rules require the introduction of quarantine, a ban on the movement of animals, inspection of the entire livestock and an epizootic investigation. Quarantine usually means isolation of farms, veterinary control and preventive measures (vaccination, treatment), and forced slaughter applies primarily to sick and contact animals.
Deputy of the Novosibirsk Legislative Assembly Vyacheslav Ilyukhin on March 12, at a meeting of the commission for interaction with law enforcement agencies, said that he had contacted the prosecutor’s office about the seizure of animals from residents of Novosibirsk villages.
“Well, imagine, they came to your home and they took your cat and killed it. Oh, God! And here, on top of everything else, it’s a wet nurse, cows. Do you understand what’s happening? Well, egregious things are happening, in my opinion, some kind of atrocity, some kind of nonsense in general! How can you fight against your people like that?!” said the deputy.
On the Internet, most users support village residents.
“they are hiding foot and mouth disease because they apparently stopped vaccinating.... And it is a clear picture of once again striking a blow at the private economy.... Our government is not the people’s, but corrupt and treacherous!”
“But our people will endure everything... and honestly, if my cattle were mine, I wouldn’t let them do whatever they want... Until I was convinced myself that it was infected with something, I honestly feel sorry for the people... They are like hostages of the situation.... One of the reasons, however, is that there is no cohesion...."
“everywhere we have one from above who has written...l, without thinking.... Others, like biomass, carry out... There is no thinking of my own.... I would not carry out such an order without making sure, it’s better to let them fire me, but I will remain a human being”
“I don’t rule out an infection at the industrial site, but why do private traders indiscriminately slaughter. This is sabotage in its purest form!”
“What a horror 🤦 The cow looks healthy, it’s all being treated. 😥
Why cut if everything can be treated with antibiotics, if she is really sick?”
Meanwhile, animal rights activist Yuri Koretskikh, in an interview with the “Man Has the Right” program on Radio Liberty, explains that pasteurellosis does not pose a particular danger to humans and, according to Order No. 770 of the Ministry of Agriculture, animals with this infection must be isolated and treated, and the rest must simply be monitored. Declaring a mass quarantine for this disease is normal, but killing all animals is a direct violation of the law, says Koretskikh.
If rabies, which is fatal to humans, is discovered, veterinary standards, the expert emphasizes, require a strict response to prevent the spread of infection.
In the Novosibirsk region, according to the Ministry of Agriculture, since the beginning of 2026, 42 outbreaks of rabies have been discovered , in several cases its carriers were wild foxes that went into villages.
According to Koretsky, there are several protocols that the veterinary service and Rosselkhoznadzor can follow if even one case of rabies is detected: from isolation to killing all domestic animals, including cats and dogs in that particular area. An intermediate option is also possible, when only animals that have been in contact with the virus carrier are killed.
In the Novosibirsk region, the authorities, Koretsky believes, “decided to play it safe” and “went to extreme measures.” At the same time, he emphasizes that in case of isolated cases of rabies in a particular place, everything can get by with “little loss” when “when the forces and resources of local veterinary services are enough to come, thoroughly study everything and isolate animals that have been in contact with a carrier of the rabies virus.”
Meanwhile, according to official reports of the Russian Ministry of Agriculture, the agro-industrial complex (AIC) currently lacks approximately 6 thousand veterinarians and 2 thousand veterinary assistants. Graduates of relevant educational institutions prefer not to go to farms, but to stay in cities, where they can get a job in clinics working with domestic animals. Tightening the rules for licensing their activities also played a role in the shortage of veterinarians.
In any case, according to official regulations and laws, animals, Koretskikh explains, must be killed humanely, using special drugs. But in practice, mass slaughter often happens quite differently. “Although in cases of rabies, it is especially important that the killing be bloodless, since the virus can easily be contracted by contact with the blood of infected animals,” says the expert.
"Let them burn us too." Protests against mass destruction of livestock in Siberia continue