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This material continues the story about the simmering conflict between the residents of the Chukotka village of Beringovsky and its surrounding areas with the Australian coal company Tigers Realm Coal and its Russian ‘daughter company,’ Beringpromugol. Together with Kedr.Media we discuss how the profits from pillaging nature in southern Chukotka end up in offshore accounts, in the pockets of Russian businessmen and officials.
You can read the first part of the story here, where we report from the village of Beringovsky, where the coal industry has gone as far as to control the food supplies that local residents can access.
Fuel That Doesn't Warm
All the vehicles in Beringovsky are off-road vehicles. There's no other way, as Chukotka is a land without roads.
"People don’t ask how long the journey will take—it's considered bad luck. In these parts, either you make it, or you don't," says Valery. We’re traveling with his dog, Millie, from Beringovsky to Alkatvaam in a Trekol—an amphibious all-terrain vehicle that can navigate the swampy, hummocky tundra during the muddy season. There’s no other way to reach the village. We pass through Zarechensk—a ghost town about ten kilometers from Beringovsky. It’s one of the many military settlements in Chukotka. This one used to be a center for electronic intelligence, but in 2003, the military unit was disbanded.
We turn into the tundra. It's not clear how Valery knows which direction to go—there are no signs or landmarks, just piles of unmelted snow, ditches, bushes, and rust-colored grass.
"It's my job," he says with a laugh. "In the end, we'll get somewhere." I remember how the people of Beringovsky used to joke about the residents of Alkatvaam: "Beringpromugol promised them a road. They're still waiting."
After an hour and a half, the first rooftops appear on the horizon. The distance between Beringovsky and Alkatvaam is about 20 kilometers, but the journey can take anywhere from 40 minutes to half a day. At the entrance to the village, there’s a garbage dump. The tundra, like an overly decorated Christmas tree, is strewn with colorful plastic bags and packaging.
Alkatvaam is situated on a river of the same name. In Chukchi, the name means "river with depressions." We arrive into the village just as the weather is changing. Yesterday, it was as sunny as a summer day, but today there's a misty rain, a piercing wind, and a thick fog that will cloak everything by evening.
They say Chukotka is closer to God—that the sky here is lower than on the ‘mainland,’’ which feels especially the case in Alkatvaam. The fog descending from the hills compresses the space between the sky and the earth, eventually "swallowing" the horizon, leaving only the outlines of the houses and mountains.
But Alkatvaam's proximity to the divine doesn't help: no matter how much the villagers dream of a road, new housing, the revival of reindeer herding, or the return of fish, the low sky – like the coal industry under it – doesn't hear them.
Although a little over two hundred people are registered in the village, only about a hundred actually live there. There are only four streets: Sovetskaya, Pionerskaya, Gagarina, and Tegrynkeu. The administration is a one-story building that looks more like a shed covered in corrugated metal. The post office is based there, too. Under the windows, teenagers huddle, shoulders hunched against the cold as they fidget on a bench, trying to catch a Wi-Fi signal. Across from the administration building is a school with a plaque from the federal program "Growth Point," which looks newer than everything else. Most of Alkatvaam's houses are in disrepair—none of them are concrete, only wooden structures ‘upgraded’ with metal siding. However, several school classrooms have been renovated—though there aren't many students to teach. Children and teenagers in the village are few and far between.
Next to the administration building is the only store and bakery in the village. The selection is small; everyone is waiting for the start of the maritime import season, but the basic choice of buckwheat, sugar, oil, flour, and bread is always available. Behind it is the boiler room, where coal is shoveled into the furnace. To heat Alkatvaam, they have to buy fuel from Beringpromugol.
The village head, a Chukchi woman named Irina Nananayina, grabs a handful from the black pile near the boiler room: "This batch is okay, but what they brought before was a nightmare. Not coal, but some kind of sand. It burns out quickly, gives no heat, and looked more like dirt."
Warmth in Alkatvaam is a luxury. People complain about the cold in their homes and at work not only in winter but also during the off-season. The village stands in a lowland among hills and is swept constantly by biting winds.
HOW IS THE CLIMATE CHANGING IN CHUKOTKA, AND WHAT DOES COAL MINING HAVE TO DO WITH IT?
Despite traditionally harsh weather in these parts, global warming has reached Chukotka. The Arctic is warming about four times faster than the rest of the planet. The Bering Sea has been significantly altered due to temperature anomalies in the ocean and the atmosphere. In 2020, the area of winter ice in the sea shrank to its lowest extent in the past 5,500 years.
"The general trend of climate warming in Chukotka has been evident since the 1980s. If we look at Anadyr, there was a sharp increase between 2011 and 2020, when the average temperature for the decade rose by about one and a half degrees—from -6.4°C in 2001–2010 to -5°C," says local historian Yevgeny Basov, who has lived in Chukotka all his life and traveled to its most remote parts. "Comparing these figures with the average temperature from 1971 to 1980, you can see a more significant trend: a three-degree rise from -8°C to -5°C. There are also visible changes. Compared to previous decades, the tundra is undergoing a rapid process of shrub 'greening.' The same is happening with insects—by appearances, there seem to be more of them, and species thatwere not observed here before are now appearing."
"Who benefits from coal mining in the Arctic?" asks regional environmental safety expert Anton Lementuev. "My answer is no one, except the owners of coal companies. Neither the state nor the local population benefits from this. Right now, the coal mine in Beringovsky is small, but if mining continues and coal extraction develops in the Arctic, we'll have another source of greenhouse gasses, which on top of everything else, are also difficult to comprehensively account for."
“We pray for the coal to run out”
Alkatvaam is the epicenter of an environmental crisis. The village is closer than any other to both the coal mine and the shift camp, which Beringpromugol also named Alkatvaam. In recent years, there have been persistent rumors about closing the village—its survival is supported by its national status, a few remaining non-condemned houses, and a handful of determined Chukchi residents who refuse to leave their ancestral land.
Activist Zina Lifanova believes that within a year, there will be no fish left in the Alkatvaam River, which the locals rely on for food.
"The residents will resist, but who will help them, who will listen? They say they're ready to stand with rifles against eviction, but if the company decides to get rid of the village, nothing will stop them."
The Alkatvaam River isn't the most abundant in fish on Chukotka, but its importance to the locals is immeasurable. The river sustains them, even in the hardest years. Now, however, if they can't stock up for the winter, they have to rely on canned goods from the store during the cold months—a hardship for the community.
"We used to drink straight from the river; the water was crystal clear. Now we're afraid—they're washing filth into it. We even find blackened fish. When you start cleaning it, the guts are filled with coal—this never used to happen. We’re also catching mutants now: fish with deformed jaws or with a strange half-milk, half-roe substance inside," shares fisherman Mikhail.
He says the situation sharply worsened last year when blasting operations began, and the processing plant was launched.
"For several days, the water was black. After a while, I caught a grayling—its stomach was filled with dead fry and black sediment. You often see dead fry in the river now too, covered in filth. It's especially bad in the spring when the snow melts and washes down from the mine into the river."
Mikhail hopes that the river will recover if the coal miners leave, but he believes this will only happen when the coal runs out.
— Are people in the village outraged? — I ask.
— Mostly, it's the elderly left here. We don't have the strength, and no amount of requests or complaints to them [“Beringpromugol”] make a difference. They don’t listen to anyone, and for the younger generation, it doesn’t matter as much as it does to us. We’ve tried appealing to higher authorities, but they say coking coal is expensive and needed by the country. So, we stay quiet and pray for the coal to run out. The sooner, the better. Someday the river must recover. It will cleanse itself. And the fish will return, just like before.
Mikhail recalls with childlike wonder how salmon used to swim upstream in such large numbers that they almost washed ashore.
Back then, they would haul in fish by the sackful during this season, but now he catches only two or three grayling in a day. Whitefish, burbot, and char are almost unheard of in Alkatvaam today.
Regarding the rumors of resettlement, Mikhail responds calmly: "They’ve been talking about it for years. But our ancestors are buried here, and we must stay."
"We often perform a ritual of thanksgiving. We give thanks to the river and the land for the gifts they provide, and we express our gratitude to everything that surrounds us," says Valentina Ranakvurgina.
She is one of the few remaining Chukchi in Alkatvaam who was born in a yaranga and migrated here in 1953 from the village of Tumanskoye, which no longer exists, either on maps or in reality.
Alkatvaam was originally envisioned as a satellite village to supply Beringovsky with meat—seven reindeer herding brigades moved here from Tumanskoye. But now, reindeer herding is just a memory here.
WHY REINDEER HERDING IS DISAPPEARING IN CHUKOTKA
Local historian Yevgeny Basov attributes the decline of reindeer herding in Chukotka to three main factors: overgrazing and unwise herd expansion, the mechanization of the industry, and the Sovietization of indigenous peoples.
"In the USSR, there was a planned economy—more, better, faster. Reindeer herders understood that a certain territory could support, for example, a maximum of 100,000 reindeer. If that number rose to 120,000, the herd would shrink to 80,000 in ten years because the grazing base would be depleted. But the Soviet mindset was, 'Those 80,000 will be a problem for later.' Immediate results and over-fulfillment of plans were the priority. From the 1960s, mechanization was introduced to intensify operations—this added extra costs, making reindeer herding expensive. The most significant factor in the decline, however, was the herders themselves. In Chukotka, there's a saying: 'It's not the person who herds the reindeer, but the reindeer that lead the person.' Back in the 1950s, when Soviet power was just beginning here, there were true reindeer herders for whom this was not just a job but a way of life. By the end of the Soviet era, generations had changed—children who had studied in boarding schools began pursuing professions and acquiring apartments, while trips to the tundra became more like work shifts. This marked the beginning of the departure from the traditional way of life. Fewer and fewer high-quality herders remained—if you don’t live in the tundra, the knowledge fades. This problem was first discussed in the 1970s, loudly voiced in the 1980s, but by the 1990s, survival took priority over cries for help."
Today, reindeer herding in southern Chukotka survives in places like Meynypilgyno and Khatyrka. Around 2 billion rubles are allocated annually to support the industry in the region. Basov describes reindeer herding as an economic black hole—there’s enough money, but it benefits neither people nor industry. "At the end of last year, the entire Chukotka herd numbered about 115,000 reindeer, with around 600-700 workers involved in the sector. Despite complex logistics and high costs, the annual subsidy is quite sufficient. But herders complain about low wages, and farms struggle with inadequate resources. Essentially, the industry is dying. During Roman Abramovich's time, the situation improved—he imposed a moratorium on slaughter, and the herd increased to 150,000. Two processing plants were also established to produce sausages, salami, and other products—one of the few export-worthy items from Chukotka. However, as the herd size declines, only three farms now supply these plants. For years, negotiations have been ongoing about increasing the herd size and intensifying production to supply not just the regional market but also the mainland. But there's simply not enough raw material."
Basov suggests that reindeer herding in Chukotka is long overdue for a complete overhaul of its concept. This requires choosing a development path. The options are either a commercial one focused on meat production or an ethnographic one aimed at preserving indigenous traditions. The first option, putting the industry on a profitable footing that would eliminate the need for subsidies, hasn't materialized, while the second would involve reducing the number of herding brigades and farms. "But this is a crucial cultural component. How do you tell people that we're giving up most of the brigades? It would be very painful. The population has learned from bitter experience—it feels like another round of destruction under the guise of good intentions, leaving nothing in the end. People are afraid. So, the approach is: let it be imperfect and flawed, but at least it still works as it is now," concludes the historian.
"Well, when you think about it, what am I giving thanks for? For the fact that we've dumped on nature ourselves? I never imagined what life would be like without the reindeer. Until the time came. We're being punished. We didn't take care of what we had. We should be outraged," Valentina Grigoryevna pauses and then answers herself, "But what's the point of our outrage? There's no progress.”
Russian Traces in an Australian Company
Tigers Realm Coal (TIG or "Tigers") is an Australian-registered company with shares traded on the Australian stock exchange. Until April of this year, it operated in Russia through several subsidiaries that transport and export coking coal as part of the "Amaam" coal project.
DOES TIGERS REALM COAL MINE COAL ELSEWHERE?
Explained by environmental expert Evgeny Simonov:
When it became clear that the most profitable mines were those that could load coal directly from the pit onto a ship and transport it to China, Chukotka attracted international investors. Naturally, this didn't happen without the involvement of Australian ‘junior’ firms—smaller companies who turn a sizeable profit from preparing large deposits for sale to bigger players around the world. This is how the little-known Australian company TIG ended up buying a small Russian company.
It's important to understand that Australia is a mining country whose industry subsists on coal, so you’re not going to end up surprising or shaming them about it. No one would even think that they’re doing anything wrong—public opinion sees TIG as a company bringing the torch of Australian coal industry expertise to the remote Chukotka region.
‘Tigers’ is a classic ‘junior’ startup. That’s basically to say, a group of wealthy guys got together, pooled their money, and started thinking, "Where else can we mine coal?" In Australia, this is a fairly common ‘sport.’ In the end they identified three deposits: in Colombia, Canada, and Chukotka. But after several years of preliminary asset evaluations, it became clear that the game would only be worth the effort in Chukotka. Therefore, TIG has not conducted coal mining anywhere else in the world besides Russia.
The Amaam project consists of a southern and a northern deposit. It is exactly here, in the area near the village of Alkatvaam, where the ‘Fandyushkin Field’ and ‘Resonant’ (Звонкое) open-pit mines are located, and where Beringpromugol is currently conducting mining operations. The total area that could be developed by the entire coal project spans 709 km². Licenses for development in the area belong to companies that until recently were part of the TIG structure: Beringpromugol is responsible for the northern Amaam, while rights to the southern part, near Lake Arinay and Ushakov Bay, are held by the North Pacific Coal Company (STUK).
Until recently, ‘Tigers’ controlled a total of 14 subsidiary companies: 6 registered in Cyprus and 5 in Russia. Among the latter are Beringpromugol, Beringpromservice, Coal Port, STUK, and the company managing them all, Bering Coal Invest.
As discovered by the NGO Arctida, until 2021, one-third of STUK’s shares were owned by geologist Yuri Radchenko, the father of Svetlana Radchenko, who has held the position of Deputy Minister of Natural Resources and Ecology for the past ten years.
From 2006 to 2014, Svetlana headed the legal department of the Ministry of Natural Resources. Rosnedra (the Federal Agency for Subsoil Use) and its regional branches, which issue mining licenses, fall under the ministry's jurisdiction.
"Even though Radchenko didn't work directly in the agency that issued the license for the Amaam project – and the Ministry of Natural Resources and Rosnedra are working together to develop a common licensing procedure – she could have influenced decisions made by lower-level authorities," considers Ilya Shumanov, director of Arktida. “It’s interesting that Rosnedra's administrative regulations for issuing and registering mineral extraction licenses appeared in 2009, during the period when Svetlana Radchenko headed the legal department that coordinated all legislative activities of the Ministry of Natural Resources.”
STUK was established in 1995, eleven years before TIG entered Russia. In addition to Yuri Radchenko, the company's founders included Leonid Skoptsov and Mikhail Mogutov. From 2008 to 2010, STUK conducted geological exploration of coal in the southern part of the Amaam project, but the company did not yet have extraction permits at that time. According to Arctida's experts, TIG's initial partnership with STUK was essential for establishing connections with Russian officials who control the licensing process. By 2010, STUK was 80% controlled by Tigers Realm Coal. Skoptsov worked for Tigers from 2011 to 2017 as a "government relations manager," as he described his role in his profile on the now-suspended "Australia-Russia Dialogue" business organization website.
In its annual report from 2011, TIG noted that "employees from the Russian company STUK [...] played a key role in submitting the necessary documentation, leading to the Russian Federal Agency for Subsoil Use confirming coal reserves at Amaam." The company stated, "This will allow STUK to proceed with obtaining a mining permit." In 2013, Chukotnedra (the Chukotka branch of Rosnedra) issued the company a mining license. TIG then informed shareholders that "STUK's management has well-established relationships with the regional government and extensive experience in obtaining regulatory approvals."
After STUK acquired the mining license, TIG purchased the remaining 20% of Eastshore Coal Holding Limited, a Cyprus-registered company that owned STUK. Under the deal, the final owners of the mining license would receive a 2% royalty from future gross sales. In essence, TIG ‘bought’ control over Chukotka's coal mining in exchange for the promise of royalty payments.
Initially, ‘Tigers’ considered the southern portion of the Amaam coal project as its main asset, given that the mineral reserves there are five times greater than in the northern part. However, in 2014, TIG decided to focus on developing deposits near Alkatvaam and Beringovsky, citing the "early launch potential." The northern reserves are closer to an already existing coal terminal, just 35 km from the mining site. ‘Tigers’ purchased the Beringovsky port that same year for $5.1 million.
In 2015, a 3% royalty beneficiary from gross sales became Siberian Tigers International, a Cyprus-registered company, 50.05% of which is currently owned by Leonid Skoptsov. Skoptsov is also listed as a founder of Beringpromugol, which holds the mining license for the northern part of the Amaam project.
At the end of 2016, TIG began coal production in the northern part of the Amaam project at the Fandyushkin Field deposit. That same year, the company agreed to pay a 2% royalty on gross revenue from sales for 20 years (capped at $25 million) to its joint venture partners in Cyprus: Rosmiro Investments Limited and BS Chukchi Investments. Rosmiro, the owner of Beringpromugol, was fully owned by BS Chukchi Investments before being acquired by TIG.
Two weeks after this agreement, the first batch of coal from TIG, extracted at Fandyushkin Field, was exported. Since then, Tigers Realm Coal has sold over 5 million tons of coal from the northern deposits of the Amaam project and generated more than $400 million in revenue.
Alongside Leonid Skoptsov, Siberian Tigers International is co-owned by Canadian geologist Alan Arthur Johnson, along with his firm JFT 2017 Enterprises. In the mid-1990s, Johnson was the president of the Coal Association of Canada. Before that, he served as a member of the Canadian Parliament (representing the Progressive Conservative Party of Canada), where he chaired the energy and mining committee. Arctida also noted Johnson's involvement in BS Chukchi Investments—his JFT 2017 Enterprises is a minority shareholder in the company.
Another shareholder of BS Chukchi Investments is the Cyprus-based company Prontoservus Limited.
Its ultimate beneficiaries include Sergey Arbuzov, Governor of the National Bank of Ukraine (NBU) during Viktor Yanukovych's presidency, Ukrainian oligarch Sergey Kurchenko, and businessman and former Ukrainian parliament member Oleksandr Onyshchenko. Arbuzov owned the offshore company Quickpace Limited (later owned by Onyshchenko), which held the frozen funds of former President Yanukovych.
Former parliament member Oleksandr Onyshchenko fled Ukraine in 2016 due to fraud charges amounting to 740 million hryvnias related to the extraction and sale of natural gas from UkrGasVydobuvannya. In 2024, he was sentenced in absentia to 15 years in prison with property confiscation. The fugitive Ukrainian oligarch Sergey Kurchenko settled in Russia after 2014. In 2018, his company ‘Gas Alliance’ gained the status of the sole supplier of coal from the Donetsk People’s Republic and Luhansk People’s Republic to Russia.
By 2023, TIG had paid over $1.4 million in royalties to these offshore companies, and in 2012, made a one-time payment of $400,000 to BS Chukchi Investments. In February 2024, Tigers Realm Coal announced amendments to the royalty agreement, committing to pay $4.5 million to the offshore entities by mid-2025.
Evading Sanctions and the New Owner
In 2023, TIG achieved a record coal production of 1.6 million tons, a 56% increase from 2021, the year before the military action in Ukraine. During the same period, the volume of coal sold increased by 39%, and revenue grew by 35%. In August of the previous year, ‘Tigers’ announced deals to supply coal to four Chinese clients and expressed plans to collaborate with Indian and Vietnamese buyers.
On March 10, 2022, Australia imposed sanctions on Russia, including coal in the list of banned imports. Importing Russian coal into Australia became a criminal offense, but this wasn’t TIG's business model: they mine coal in Russia and sell it in Asia. This led to a two-year legal dispute between TIG and the Australian sanctions authority, which didn’t stop the coal miners or freeze their activities in Russia. Throughout this period, they continued mining despite the ambiguous status of their operations. Since the start of the conflict in Ukraine, ‘Tigers’ has sold around 2.3 million tons of Russian coal, and the taxes and fees TIG paid to the Russian government increased more than 3.5 times, from $1.6 million in 2021 to $5.8 million in 2022. In 2023, the company improved its mining and sales figures again, despite a decrease in overall revenue due to lower coal prices.
In March 2023, the Australian sanctions authority, assessing TIG’s activities, stated that the company’s operations were "likely to be banned." In response, TIG filed a lawsuit in federal court, arguing that technically it did not export coal across Russia's borders: the company's work ends within the country in preparing the goods for export, and the rest is handled by the buyers' ships. TIG also contended that transporting coal to Russian ports and loading it onto ships in Russian ports did not constitute "transportation" as described in the export ban rules. In early April of this year, the case was dismissed — the court ruled that "the activities of TIG's Russian subsidiaries include actions that constitute the import of sanctioned goods."
A week after the federal court's decision, TIG announced the sale of its Russian assets for an "proposed amount" of $49 million. The share purchase agreement was signed with the Russian company APM-Invest, owned by businessman Mark Buzuk.
The Australian stock exchange described him as a "local businessman with over 30 years of executive experience in the mining industry." The exchange's statement also noted that "Mr. Buzuk has a proven entrepreneurial record of mining projects in remote areas, both from new and existing deposits." The Chairman of the Board of Tigers Realm Coal, Craig Wigill, introduced him as an entrepreneur "not currently subject to personal sanctions and without connections to the Russian state."
However, an investigation by Arctida revealed that Buzuk had previously been a partner of sanctioned Russian oligarchs Viktor Vekselberg and Alisher Usmanov.
Buzuk is also an investor in the Arkhangelsk Commercial Seaport alongside Andrei Patrushev — the son of Nikolai Patrushev, who held the position of Secretary of the Russian Security Council until May 2024 and, in August 2024, headed the Maritime Collegium created by Vladimir Putin. Both Andrei and Nikolai Patrushev are under international sanctions as well, including those from Australia.
Apparently, TIG has once again followed the same path that it charted at the beginning of its operations in Russia — only now, in this challenging period, it relies not on the Radchenko family, but on a well-connected Russian businessman.
‘Tigers’ announced that the proceeds from the sale to Buzuk are slated to be used to return capital to shareholders. Among the four largest shareholders of TIG is the company RFPI Investment Management, which, as of February, holds 8.41% of TIG's shares and is listed as a subsidiary of the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF).
RDIF was established in 2011 by then-President Dmitry Medvedev as a sovereign wealth fund. In 2013, RDIF invested $14.9 million in TIG. The sale of TIG's assets to Mark Buzuk will result in RDIF receiving a payout for its stake in ‘Tigers.’
"At every stage of its operations in Russia, the Australian company Tigers Realm Coal relied on influential people with political connections," says Director of Arctida Ilya Shumanov. "In the first stage, they depended on the family of Svetlana Radchenko, the Deputy Minister of Natural Resources, and when exiting the Russian market, they turned to Mark Buzuk, a business partner of the family of former FSB chief Nikolai Patrushev. The issue isn't just that such practices have an obvious corruption context, giving the Australian company significant advantages, including licensing and the quick sale of its business amidst the de facto ban on foreign ownership. These connections also allowed the company to avoid fulfilling environmental and social obligations, leading to serious harm in Chukotka and depriving indigenous peoples of their traditional lands," Shumanov believes. According to the Director of Arctida.
"The impunity and permissiveness of Tigers Realm Coal led to the disregard of Australian sanctions, which became the subject of legal proceedings in Australia. Above all, "such barbaric management," as he calls it, "leads to the complete disregard of indigenous peoples' rights and the destruction of the fragile Arctic ecosystem."
"The Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF) is one of the most opaque coffers of the Kremlin. It was created to stimulate joint foreign and Russian investments, but after falling under sanctions, foreign investor interest in it decreased. The fund has an extensive network of subsidiaries in various jurisdictions, many of which are considered offshore entities. Kirill Dmitriev, the director of RDIF, is closely connected to Vladimir Putin's family. Dmitriev's wife, Natalia Popova, works as Deputy Director at Innopraktika, which is headed by Putin's younger daughter, Katerina Tikhonova," Shumanov concludes.
OFFICIAL COMMENT FROM RDIF:
"The Fund has been conducting its activities in full compliance with the legislation of the Russian Federation since its establishment in 2011 and regularly submits all the required reports in accordance with the applicable regulatory standards. Throughout its operation, the Russian Direct Investment Fund (RDIF) has received numerous Russian and international professional awards, confirming its status as a leading innovative investment fund.
One of the principles of RDIF's work is co-investment. The Fund strictly adheres to the best global investment practices, which is recognized by all its international co-investors, as well as by national regulatory authorities. Evidence of the high-quality standards of the Fund’s operations is more than 100 investments made in partnership with leading global investment funds. The participation of large co-investors in the Fund's deals itself confirms the transparency of its activities. Furthermore, by collaborating with reputable international partners—leading investment funds and well-known companies—RDIF has rightfully earned the reputation of a reliable partner under professional management of the highest quality.”
"Useful for those who survived and remained"
"We don't even know what to expect or think. Last year, the new governor visited—all the villagers told him to replace [Yefanov]; we don't need someone like him here. There are rumors that they want to totally turn Beringovsky into a coal settlement for rotational workers. And the indigenous people will be relocated—but where to? Maybe that's why the district administration isn't investing money here," Beringovsky activist Larisa Borisovna says sadly in response to a question about expectations from the new company owner. Indeed, by the end of June, APM-Invest under Buzuk still hadn’t made any significant presence in Beringovsky or Alkatvaam.
The head of Beringovsky, Sergey Skrupskiy, believes that if the new owners manage to find an approach to the local population and put good managers in place, it will have a positive impact on the settlement.
"When any company comes to a territory where people have lived for centuries, initially it always raises concerns, even rejection. If at this stage the company’s leader can find an approach to the population, that’s a very good leader. There have been many such cases in Russia. Take Kekura, Baimka—there are only positive reviews about their interaction with the population. And here, if management works well with the people and the local government, there won’t be any problems," the official suggests. Skrupskiy is also certain that the coal miners will move into the southern part of Amaam, but how soon depends on the market situation.
Local historian Evgeniy Basov recalls another case of transferring foreign assets to a Russian company in Chukotka. The Canadian company Kinross Gold, which owned the Kupol and Dvoynoye deposits, was represented by two enterprises—the Chukotka Mining and Geological Company and ‘Northern Gold.’ In June 2022, Kinross Gold, which had been operating in Russia since 1995, hurriedly sold its assets to Vladislav Sviblov's company, Highland Gold Mining. Initially, Kinross asked for $680 million for the deal, which was already below the market value of the assets, but the enterprises went to Highland Gold for only $340 million. In November 2023, Sviblov and Highland Gold were included in the UK sanctions list.
"A few months after Kinross left, the workers at Kupol themselves started leaking videos on social media showing environmental violations. Solid waste scattered around, some greenish liquid leaks found in the tundra. Although the Canadians were super-capitalists, they had two main gods: labor safety and environmental protection. So, the departure of foreign business is not just a loss of investment, but also of the culture of technology and production that it brings. Kupol was an example for other enterprises and set the standard. If there are no benchmarks, others have nothing to aspire to. Now at Kupol, working conditions, wages, and environmental standards are deteriorating. I could call it, 'feel the difference.' Business has started operating in a Russian way: minimizing losses and maximizing profits. Therefore, now that TIG is transferrig assets to APM-Invest, I have no reason to believe that the approaches to business, ecology, and the population will improve. On the contrary, I expect the situation to worsen in the regions of Beringovsky and Alkatvaam," Basov argues.
According to Evgeniy Simonov, coal mining near Alkatvaam and Beringovsky is currently still within the limits of a "sandbox"—1.5 million tons near the port, in fairly limited areas, and with primitive technologies for on-site enrichment. The biggest concern is the plans to expand the coal business in the southern part of the deposits—this would lead to huge losses of precious natural territories.
"It is very difficult to improve the situation at the northern deposit in a substantial way. The locals have no prospects, and fewer people remain. The settlements will survive only for as long as Buzuk needs them. All the infrastructure that’s been created there doesn’t contribute to their development, only to survival," says the environmentalist. "The social responsibility of businesses is a very big deal in remote areas, where the settlements have no prospects, but the companies do. So they’re not fools: they allocate some pennies to the indigenous people, pensioners, and the few children remaining. They organize some holiday, clear the snow, buy gifts. The problem is that this is not development, but just maintaining the current social environment. And perhaps, its quiet demise."
Simonov adds that extractive companies often build isolated camps for rotational workers—this wasn’t invented by the ‘Tigers’; many mining companies do this to supposedly avoid conflicts with the local population. As a result, the infrastructure in these already poor areas dwindles because companies develop only their own infrastructure, creating a new, alien environment. The meaning of development in these areas changes—it turns from local to rotational.
Environmental safety expert and editor of greenthinktank.life, Anton Lementeuv, believes that the very idea of companies paying the local population to improve their territories is harmful.
"What good is it if people are coughing, sick more often, and dying earlier in beautiful houses behind corrugated iron fences? The company will leave, but the problems will remain—nature will be destroyed, and with it the health of the people. We need to ask the question, 'What is the purpose of this extraction?' The answer should include not only benefits for a specific settlement, where a new site will be set up and houses will be painted in bright colors, but for the country as a whole. There are many tragic cases, where the community receives good money from the extraction of some resource, and the more valuable the deposit and resource, the more money gets invested in them. Poverty is the foundation of such things.
But in the end, it turns into a grim scenario—people stop building their own sustainable economy. Handouts corrupt anyone—why do anything if you can just praise, for example, a coal company, cough in the evenings, and go to a resort once a year for treatment?
Of course, often you can't even expect that from companies, but you need to weigh the losses and gains from the presence of industrialists near settlements."
People in Beringovsky often said that the coal miners would offer us "beads" and "mirrors"—in other words, they would try to bribe us, take us to clean, tidy places, and tell us how justly they operate. This is a normal practice—to make a good impression before receiving guests, the company usually issues an order to clean up waste and send out the watering truck. But this didn’t happen; no local representatives of Beringpromugol made contact with us. We had to leave without the "beads" and bring our own mirrors to the ‘motherland,’ reflecting life from the distant Chukotka settlements.
