But he never told me anything. The early schemes involved only a single delivery, or a single mine. One retired mine director told Izvestia newspaper that he discovered his partners were cheating their customers in Turkey in 1994 by shipping them lower-quality coal from another mine. After he tried to break off with them, unknown assailants beat him and his wife with iron rods in their home. Today's conspiracies are wider.
Suspicion hangs over regional and local government officials as well.
The most productive mines are still largely state-owned, and regional government officials serve on the boards of directors. At one Kuzbass mine, the director said the coal company that oversees the state's interest is raking off the profits from his mine, and he is helpless to stop it. His mine should be profitable, he said, but it is almost bankrupt. But it keeps the vast percentage of the income from the sales, leaving the mine without enough even to cover its costs. The director can't sell the coal himself, although he has buyers, because the enrichment factory refuses to process it for him.