Baikal paper mill to be shut down

The Baikal Pulp and Paper Mill will be shut down and “there is no turning back,” Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev said at a meeting with United Russia activists in the Irkutsk region on Tuesday. The government has already resolved on that issue, the prime minister stressed. The leader of the United Russia Party asked the deputy chairman of the regional legislative assembly about his view of paper mill fate, and received the answer that mill must be definitely shut down. Medvedev reminded the audience that the history of the mill is one of the most complicated industrial situations that is “accompanied by heated debates”. “It is time to recollect courage and make important decisions,” the prime minister said. Earlier reports said the program to halt and shut down the paper mill may be implemented in one year, while production will be shifted to other enterprises. The Baikal Pulp and Paper Mill was commissioned in 1966. It produces about 200,000 tons of pulp a year, and the state has a 49 percent stake in it.