The term "workplace safety" took on a whole new meaning in Russia after hundreds of migrant workers brawled at a massive natural gas field in Siberia..According to Russian social media the fight involved 500 workers from Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan at a Gazprom work site in the Irkutsk region. Russian state media TASS reported nine people have been taken to hospital so far, some with "severe" head injuries..The fight reportedly broke out when someone tried to enter the camp canteen without queuing. The dispute was quickly dispersed, but some time later the Kyrgyzstan workers went to the Tajik dormitories and the rumble was on..Local law enforcement and representatives of the Kyrgyz foreign affairs attache were continuing to investigate Monday to identify the participants, which face expulsion from Russia for terms of up to 40 years..Thousands of immigrants from poorer Central Asian regions work in Russia’s oil patch, sparking tensions with locals and each other..In August 2021, following a series of fights involving immigrants in various regions of Russia, its ministry of Internal Affairs vowed to “brutally” deport violators to their countries of origin for “gross violations” of public order, including the right to work or cross into Russia itself. To the end of 2021, it reported that it had expelled more than 400 immigrant workers for fighting..The fight took place at Gazprom’s Kovykta gas field, which was inaugurated by Vladimir Putin in December of last year. The massive field is estimated to contain more than 95 trillion cubic feet of gas and 750 million barrels of condensates and liquids, making it one of the largest undeveloped fields in Russia, if not the world..Gazprom is under contract to supply China with some 38 billion cubic metres per year — about 3.5 billion cubic feet per day — after 2025. Since 2019 Russia has been building pipelines to China at a furious pace to meet its contractual obligations..Of Russia’s state oil and gas giants, Gazprom is most acutely feeling the bite of Western sanctions as the EU weans itself off oil and natural gas from the Putin regime..Last month it posted a 41% drop in its 2022 profits and eliminated its dividend, which amounted to $15 billion US in the first half of 2022, prior to the invasion of Ukraine. According to Bloomberg estimates, Russia is losing as much as $4 billion a month in energy revenues along with its dominant market share in the EU and Asia..On Monday, the London-based Energy Institute reported that LNG imports into the EU surpassed Russian pipeline deliveries in 2022 for the first time. Russian pipeline exports to Europe and Asia fell to about 29% of the global export market, from 43% in 2021.
