Prosecutor’s Office: All new military facilities in the Arctic built in line with environmental safety regulations
© RIA Novosti. Valeriy Melnikov

Prosecutor’s Office: All new military facilities in the Arctic built in line with environmental safety regulations

The Military Prosecutor's Office has made sure all military construction projects in the Arctic cannot go ahead without a full set of approval documents, above all the environmental impact assessment, RIA Novosti quoted Military Prosecutor of the Northern Fleet Andrei Popov as saying.

Forty-one state contract facilities worth over 55 billion rubles are currently being built and overhauled in the Arctic. Last year, violations were registered at these facilities, and the culprits were held liable, which rectified the situation.

"Inspections showed that some construction projects lacked approval documents, including environmental impact assessments. Prosecutors demanded that subcontractors and general contractors be held responsible. In 2015, nine inquiries were conducted, and the culprits had to pay a fine of over 500,000 rubles each. Presently, approval documents have been submitted on all state contracts," the prosecutor said.

Popov said the Prosecutor's Office was working to prevent other environmental violations at defense facilities in the Arctic. Particular efforts are taken not to allow any man-made emergencies to happen at oil storage terminals.

"It has been established that seven bases had over 50,000 metric tons of oil products stored in 120 oil tanks with expired service lives built between the 1930s and 1990s. The prosecutors demanded that the situation be addressed. Over a half of the oil terminals were decommissioned, and geological examination is being conducted to eliminate soil and water pollution with oil spills and re-cultivate the soil," the military prosecutor said.