Kazakh Miners Vow to Protest Until Demands Met

Excerpt from report by Kazakhstan Today news agency website

Satpayev, 2 February: The relatives of protesting miners demand that the Kazakhmys corporation management fulfil the demands of the miners put forwards during preparations for a protest action, a [Kazakhstan Today] news agency correspondent has learned from a Zhezkazgan-based journalist, Vladimir Prutik, who is now at the entrance to the administrative building of the Yuzhno- Zhezkazganskiy mine.

“Some 1,000 people have gathered here. They are miners, wives and mothers of underground workers. Police and National Security Committee officers are also here. The miners spontaneously held a working meeting, where they resolved to strike until their demands were met. They are backed by the miners’ relatives, who are tired of waiting for meagre salaries and awaiting the return of men each time with alarm,” Prutik said.

[Passage omitted: talks are being held - COVERED]

“The miners have not yet come up to the surface and the situation remains tense. At the moment, the process of talks between workers and the management of the Kazakhmys corporation is under way,” the deputy head of the trade union of the Kazakhmys Corporation LLC, Valeriy Boychuk, said.

As reported earlier, miners of the mines Yuzhnyy, Zapadnyy and Vostochnyy, which are owned by the Kazakhmys corporation, carried out a protest action today – night shift workers did not come up to the surface.

“They have decided to stay there until their demands are met,” a member of the initiative group of the united organization of miners of the Satpayev town, Kanatbek Murzatov, said.

Originally published by Kazakhstan Today news agency website, Almaty, in Russian 1025 2 Feb 08.

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