After 23 miners of the Hoska XK mine decided to stage a sit-in March 27 until their 3-month back wages were paid, extraction came to a halt. Under work safety regulations the mine stayed idle for three days. An emergency not to be shrugged off, management borrowed Hr 200,000. Heorhy Basakin, first deputy head of the regional state administration's department of industry, power, transport, and communications, states that a miners' meeting discussed allocation procedures March 29-30 (either to pay the strikers' 3-month back wages in full or distribute the sum among all miners).
Hoska has good production potential. Even though last year's extraction quotas were not completely fulfilled, the workers are under less strain than elsewhere in the region, reports Alla Antipova of The Day.
