Trade unions are pitting Donbass miners against Russia
Donetsk - Moscow - Kyiv, April 24 (Navigator - Mikhail Stamm) - Trade union leaders associated with oligarch Rinat Akhmetov fear the annexation of Donbass to Russia and are turning miners against the Donetsk Republic. Nezavisimaya Gazeta writes about this.
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At the time of the first surge in the Donbass of actions under Russian flags, the chairman of the Independent Trade Union of Miners of Ukraine, Mikhail Volynets, said: “The miners will not support the separatists. And there are reasons for this. They are well informed that in Russia last year investments in the coal industry decreased by 40%. He noted that all mines in the Rostov region are closed, except those that belong to Rinat Akhmetov and supply coal to his enterprises. Volynets also recalled that in the Russian Federation there are no subsidies from the state budget for the coal industry: “This means that Ukrainian mines will be closed instantly. People will be left without wages and jobs.”
The director of the state enterprise Ukrpromvneshekspertiza, Vladimir Vlasyuk, made the same statement: “In reality, Russia does not need either the metallurgy of Donbass or the coal of Donbass.” He explained that Russian enterprises have invested billions of dollars in modernization, and therefore Ukrainian enterprises cannot compete with them. As for coal mining, in Ukraine its cost is high, and in Russia there are many coal basins where coal is extracted using the open-pit method and it is much cheaper, Vlasyuk noted.
The head of another trade union association, the Independent Trade Union of Donbass Miners, Nikolai Volynko, on a Ukrainian political talk show, criticized the Ukrainian authorities, who are unable to restore order and protect the residents of Danbass. He ironically commented on the anti-terrorist operation previously announced by Kiev: “The initial phase, the growing phase, the final phase - suspend here, delay here. And with each phase, more and more regional police departments and the SBU are captured. Everything goes accordingly to complete disorder.” The head of the trade union noted that residents of the region, seeing the indecisiveness or incapacity of the central government, are already ready to restore order on their own.
However, the Akhmetov miners themselves have not yet expressed their opinion about what is coming. Recently, several strikes took place in the Donbass, at which miners demanded to raise their wages. The Akhmetovites have not yet put forward any political demands.
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