The Tashkent Interdistrict Economic Court has sharply reduced the amount of environmental compensation that the Shurtan Oil and Gas Production Department (part of Uzbekneftegaz JSC) must pay following a lawsuit by environmental authorities. Of the initially claimed 8.8 billion soums, the court ordered the enterprise to pay only 676,100 soums — nearly 13,000 times less than the claim.

The lawsuit was filed by the Main Department of Ecology and Climate Change of Kashkadarya Region. Earlier, during an April inspection, environmental police specialists recorded systematic violations at the enterprise: non-compliance of treatment equipment with standards, excess emissions into the atmosphere, and other deviations from environmental norms. Following the inspection, the department issued 16 mandatory orders, and the materials were sent to court.

However, during the trial, it emerged that the supervisory authority had exceeded the scope of the inspection. In addition, calculations for the key part of the financial claims were not supported by sufficient evidence, and a number of submitted materials were deemed inadmissible by the court due to procedural violations in obtaining them.

As a result, the court rejected the vast majority of the environmental agency's claims, limiting the recovery to a symbolic sum. This decision highlights serious shortcomings in the work of environmental oversight bodies and the difficulties in proving violations in court.

Source: podrobno.uz