[Summary translation prepared by Business & Human Rights Centre]

“They’ve dug up the whole country — enough, leave something for future generations.” Protests against planned copper mining continue in Bashkortostan, 29 May 2025

In the Abzelilovsky District of Bashkortostan, tensions continue to rise over plans by the Russian Copper Company to resume geological exploration on the Kryktytau mountain ridge, with the aim of subsequently building a mining and processing plant and extracting copper. In May, mining companies and republican authorities sharply intensified a propaganda campaign in support of the project, while pressure — including public pressure — began to be exerted on opponents of the development...

Protests by residents of the Abzelilovsky District and Bashkortostan civic activists against the plans of the Russian Copper Company (RCC) began in April of this year. Initial statements by mining representatives and public figures loyal to the RCC and the republican authorities in defense of the project did not satisfy activists opposing the development. Throughout April, they created several Telegram chats to discuss various ways of resisting the company’s plans…

In another petition, its authors quoted a statement by a teacher from the village of Tashbulatovo, delivered at a meeting between district administration officials, mining representatives, and local residents:

— People simply do not want to live next to a pit half a kilometer deep, with noise, dust, dirt, and poisoned water. And now this is being called a “Maidan”! We are defenders of nature! We stand for a clean environment. We are against the mining and processing plant. We, the national republics, stand for eco-tourism… And in response, there are only labels: “extremists,” “traitors,” “paid agents.” But it is not bloggers or agents who come out to these gatherings — it is ordinary men and women from neighboring villages. And they simply do not want to remain silent…

Alongside meetings with residents, the authorities and their supporters, according to a Bashkortostan civic activist, “also began smearing the most active opponents of the RCC project”…

On May 23, several vehicles carrying riot police and regular police unexpectedly arrived in the village of Askarovo — the administrative center of the Abzelilovsky District; later, pro-government channels claimed these were merely “exercises”…

On May 26, the Telegram channel Nash Kyrkty-tau reported that a complaint had been filed with the acting Minister of Internal Affairs of Bashkortostan, requesting that criminal charges be brought under several articles of the Russian Criminal Code against dozens of administrators and participants of protest channels and communities on VKontakte.