Emeute à Mezhdurechensk Междуре́ченск – mai 2010

Protest at Russian mine blast site, 28 arrested

AFP

15 05 2010

MOSCOW — Twenty-eight people were arrested when Russian authorities cracked down on a protest in a Siberian coal-mining town where at least 66 people died in explosions last weekend, officials said Saturday.

Media reports said more than 20 people had been injured late Friday evening after police clashed with the protesters, who had blocked a railroad in the disaster-struck town of Mezhdurechensk.

« Negotiations with regional government officials and police led to nothing. Soon afterwards, riot police began removing people from the railway. Rocks and bottles were thrown at the police, » Russia’s investigative committee said in a statement.

« Twenty-eight participants in the protest were taken to the Mezhdurechensk police station, » the statement said.

The investigators’ statement said that at least six police officers had been injured in the clashes in Mezhdurechensk, located in Russia’s coal-rich Kemerovo region.

Earlier, Russian news agencies quoted Kemerovo police chief Alexander Yelin as saying that 22 people had been injured in the clashes, including 17 police officers and five protesters.

Russia’s private Ren-TV television channel showed dozens of riot police with shields approaching the protesters in the night, while some young men threw rocks in response. It also showed a woman with a bloody face.

The liberal Echo of Moscow radio station reported that 200 people, including women and children, had blocked the railroad on Friday to demand better working conditions for coal miners after last weekend’s tragedy.

At least 66 people were killed and 24 people remain missing following a pair of methane gas blasts on May 8 in the Raspadskaya coal mine, Russia’s largest undergound coal mine, located in Mezhdurechensk.

The tragedy drew attention to complaints from Russia’s coal miners that they work in dangerous condition for little pay.

« It is the fault of the authorities that they pushed people onto the rails, » Ivan Mokhnachuk, head of Russia’s independent coal-miners union, told Echo of Moscow on Saturday.

« When people are kept in the dark, when their questions are not answered, when they are left alone, when every day there are dozens of funerals and the authorities do not want to talk, a situation arises where people are displeased, » he added.

State television mentioned nothing about the protests in Mezhdurechensk, which is located in the Kemerovo region of southern Siberia.

Russia’s state-owned RZD railroad company announced that movement along the railway in Kemerovo had been restored, without explaining why it had halted in the first place.

Around 20 trains were delayed because of the protest, the investigative committee said.

Russia coal miners protest after deadly blasts

Reuters

15 05 2010

Russian riot police were called in to disperse coal miners and their families who had blocked a railway line in Siberia to protest against a mine accident last weekend which killed at least 66 people.

Footage obtained by Reuters Television showed dozens of people holding candles in the dark in the town of Mezhdurechensk before the riot police moved in late on Friday.

Men, most of them young, began pelting the policemen with stones, while others were dragged off and arrested.

Russian agencies cited regional governor Aman Tuleyev as saying the protest was the work of young people and bandits.

« The young people had been purposefully stirred up, » Tuleyev said, according to Russia’s Interfax news agency.

Police said 28 people had been arrested and could be charged with blocking the railway, the agency said.

The protest was reminiscent of last summer’s demonstrations in the cement-making town of Pikalyovo, where hundreds of workers blocked a motorway in protest over job cuts and unpaid wages.

That protest led to direct intervention by Prime Minister Vladimir Putin. Shortly afterwards, President Dmitry Medvedev warned regional governors they would be sacked if they were unable to control such protests.

Russia’s Itar-Tass news agency said Tuleyev met Raspadskaya miners on Saturday. He said workers would continue to be paid while the mine was closed, and that a full investigation would be carried out into the cause of the accident.

Separate footage from Mezhdurechensk’s Kvant television showed hundreds of protesters standing outside a cultural center on Friday demanding improved wages and working conditions.

« The main thing is, none of the managers came to ask for forgiveness, not one of them, » a protester told the broadcaster.

Search operations for 24 missing miners and rescue workers have been suspended because of high methane gas levels in the mine.

The disaster was the deadliest since 110 people were killed by a methane blast at another mine in the coal-rich Kemerovo region in March 2007.

The Raspadskaya mine accounts for about 10 percent of Russia’s annual coking coal output, according to analysts.

Manifestation après la catastrophe de la mine de Sibérie

Reuters

15/05/2010

MOSCOU, 15 mai – La police anti-émeute russe a dispersé des dizaines de personnes ayant bloqué une ligne de chemin de fer après la catastrophe de la mine de charbon de Raspadskaïa, en Sibérie, qui a fait au moins 66 morts le week-end dernier.

Un film obtenu par Reuters montre des manifestants tenant une chandelle à la main dans la nuit à Mejdourechensk vendredi soir.

Des manifestants, jeunes pour la plupart, ont lancé des pierres en direction des forces de l’ordre. Les images montrent certains d’entre eux traînés par terre par les policiers et arrêtés.

Selon l’agence Interfax, qui cite le gouverneur de la province, Aman Toulïev, les manifestants étaient des bandits ou des jeunes « que l’on a montés sciemment » contre les autorités.

L’agence précise que 28 personnes ont été interpellées.

Deux explosions de méthane se sont produites dans la nuit de samedi à dimanche dernier dans la mine, située dans la région de Kemerovo, à 3.000 km à l’est de Moscou.