The Nature and Environmental Protection Agency of Montenegro (EPA) claims that the French company "Valgo" fully fulfilled the contract it had with the Government of Montenegro for the ecological remediation of the area of the former Adriatic shipyard Bijela, i.e. the export of hazardous waste.
However, the EPA did not explain how the company "Valgo" was enabled to deliver additional quantities of these waste materials to the shipyard in addition to the quantities of waste grit from ship sandblasting and soil mixed with grit that were in Bijela and whose removal was paid for by the taxpayers of Montenegro. from the former "Arsenal" from Tivat, which in the meantime caused scandals in Montenegro and Ukraine.
Most of that material from "Arsenal", where the company "Adriatic Marinas" is developing the project of the elite nautical center "Porto Montenegro", remained in Montenegro, and twenty days ago it appeared scattered on private land owned by "Railway Infrastructure of Montenegro". and the municipality of Nikšić, i.e. at the landfill of the company "Putevi" from Podgorica. Because of this, part of the citizens of Nikšić protested and announced that radical measures would be taken, if the material, which the Montenegrin authorities today claim is harmless, is not removed as soon as possible.
More than three years ago, part of the waste from "Porto Montenegro" under strange circumstances, and through the company "Valgo", ended up in Ukraine, where it turned out to be very dangerous waste, which is why a criminal investigation was launched in that country. .
After about twenty days, "Vijesti" received partial answers from the EPA to a set of questions, sent at the end of August.
Similar questions regarding the environmental scandal that occurred with the scattering of grit from the Arsenal that "transited" through Bijela, through Nikšić and Podgorica, were addressed to the Ministry of Ecology, Sustainable Development and Development of the North, i.e. the Directorate for Inspection Affairs (UIP). And while they are from the department headed by the minister Damjan Ćulafić (Democrats) told "Vijesti" that the EPA would answer instead of them, but even after more than twenty days, the UIP did not send any answers. All the journalist's attempts to get an explanation from the UIP about how thousands of tons of grit and soil mixed with grit could be transported to Nikšić in addition to their inspectors who supervised the work that "Valgo" was doing in Bijela, were unsuccessful because the official phone persons in charge of communication with the media are constantly "out of order".
"The company 'Valgo Montenegro' - part of a foreign company Podgorica with the address Trg Nikole Kovačevića 10/17, 81000 Podgorica, PIB: 03139263, had a contract with the Government of Montenegro regarding the export of hazardous waste from the Adriatic shipyard Bijela. Among other waste, the following types of waste were exported: 17 05 03* soil and stone containing dangerous substances; and 12 01 16* waste from sandblasting containing dangerous substances (in our country the name grit is domesticated). The mentioned types of waste were exported to the Kingdom of Spain and to the Kingdom of Belgium. Sandblasting waste containing hazardous substances was exported to the Kingdom of Spain to the company 'Ditecsa SM- Centro de Nerva, Carretera Nerva' - El Madrono 21670 Nerva-Huelva. The amount of exported waste is 68.463,09 tons. Waste soil and stone containing hazardous substances were also exported to the Kingdom of Belgium, the location of the company 'Carmans Blue Technology NV', Kanaalstraat 14, 3560 Lummen, or to the Kingdom of Spain at the already mentioned company 'Ditecsa SM-Centro de Nerva, Carretera Nerva': the amount of exported waste is 29.527,95 tons", EPA told "Vijesta", noting that "after these activities (exports), all amounts of the above-mentioned waste were exported from the area of the former Bijela shipyard".
They said that the contract with the Government did not allow the company "Valgo" to have any of those waste quantities remain in Montenegro, which, according to the EPA, was complied with.
The EPA previously announced that the last quantities of grit remaining from the business activity of the defunct Adriatic Shipyard were exported from Bijela in February last year, while the last round of contaminated soil was shipped from here at the end of July 2023.
Last year, "Bijela" was clean for the Agency, despite the waste from "Porto Montenegro"
On July 26 of last year, the EPA announced that "from the point of view of Chapter 27, with the completion of the remediation of the Bijela shipyard location, significant progress has been made in the implementation and enforcement of the acquis of the European Union."
"We emphasize the importance of remediation in terms of control and prevention of further pollution of the water area", said the EPA at the time, which implemented and supervised this work, which was paid dearly by Montenegrin taxpayers.
However, as it turned out only recently, the remediation of "Bijela" was not completed at all at that time because several thousand tons of grit remained in the shipyard area, where in the meantime the new repair center for yachts and megayachts of the "Adriatic 42" company began to be developed. was brought there in 2019 from "Porto Montenegro".
Former director of the company "Valgo Montenegro" Rajko Uskokovic recently confirmed to "Vijesta" that in mid-July of this year, that company handed over a total of 4.900 tons of grit from the former Tivat "Arsenal" to the company "MM Sistem" from Nikšić, free of charge. According to Uskoković, the company from Nikšić, which had all the permits for dealing with waste treatment, took that material from the vicinity of the "Bijela" shipyard in trucks to its officially registered landfill in Nikšić, and in the meantime sold it as construction material to the company "Putevi" from Podgiorica. . Uskoković emphasized that the remaining grit and soil mixed with grit originating from "Porto Montenegro" officially had the status of "non-hazardous waste" according to CETI's findings, which is why, according to him, there was no interest from business partners of the company "Valgo" from abroad to that material was taken over for purification and treatment, so it was handed over to "MM System" free of charge, because it could be used as a raw material for various construction works, primarily in the construction of roads, as it was non-hazardous.
The remediation of the site of the shipyard "Bijela" carried out by "Valgo" was part of the project "Management of industrial waste and cleaning", which Montenegro implemented with a loan from the World Bank. Through this project, the implementation of which was in charge of the EPA, the problems of "black" ecological points were solved, namely the Bijela shipyard, the ash and slag landfill "Maljevac" and the flotation tailings pond "Gradac", and the preparation of technical documentation for the rehabilitation of the red pool was carried out. sludge and solid waste landfills of KAP.
The work in "Bieja" was officially paid 23 million euros to the French company, which performed it with a series of problems and delays and a significant breakthrough in the originally contracted dynamics.
However, in the spring of 2019, the company "Adriatic Marinas-Porto Montenegro" made a special business arrangement with the company "Valgo", according to which in "Bijelo", where the French company had already started the extensive work of removing tens of thousands of cubic meters of grit from sandblasting ships and other waste from decades of ship repair activities, 3.500 cubic meters of old grit from "Porto Montenegro" and over 2.500 cubic meters of soil mixed with grit were also brought. At that time, it was announced that the grit left in "Porto Montenegro" from the former Tivat military shipyard "Arsenal" would be exported via the company "Valgo" by ships from Bijela abroad, to the same places where the French company was supposed to send the grit from the former Adriatic shipyard. However, that did not happen.
"Vijesti" from the EPA did not receive a concrete answer to the question of why the Agency, which implemented the environmental remediation project of the Adriatic Shipyard, allowed the company "Valgo" to "mix" that work with their special commercial arrangement with the company "Adriatic Marinas", i.e. why the investor "Porto Montenegro" was enabled to transfer the waste from Tivat to "Bijela" and add it to the grit and contaminated soil that were already there, and the citizens of Montenegro paid dearly for their removal.
"Here it is important to emphasize that the company 'Valgo Montenegro' doo Podgorica did not sign a contract with the Government of Montenegro, but the contract signed with the company 'Valgo Montenegro' is part of a foreign company that concerns the export of non-hazardous waste generated in the former overhaul facility 'Arsenal Tivat' ', i.e. his legal successor company 'Adriatic Marinas'. We note that the official supervision of the complete project did not state that there was a mixing of waste from the area of the shipyard 'Bijela' and waste from the area of 'Adriaic Marinas'", they told "Vijesta" from the EPA, headed by director dr. Milan Gazdić.
On paper, two companies "Valgo" in Montenegro
In Montenegro, there are two legal entities connected to the French company "Valgo": the company "Valgo Montenegro" - part of a foreign company Podgorica with the address Trg Nikole Kovačevića 10/17, 81000 Podgorica, PIB: 03139263, and the company "Valgo Montenegro" doo Podgorica, with the address Moskovska 99, office number 3, Podgorica and PIB number 03236862.
Both are founders of "VALGO SOCIETE ANONYME A CONSEIL D'ADMINISTRATION" from Rouen, France. The former is listed in the records of the Central Registry of the Commercial Court as the authorized person for representation Rajko Uskokovic who was recently appointed in front of the Montenegrin Government as Deputy Executive Director of Air Traffic Control of Serbia and Montenegro SMATSA. Another legal entity "Valgo Montenegro" doo, which has only one employee, is authorized by the director Nina Savović. She did not answer the questions of "Vijesti" regarding how "Valgo" realized the business in "Bijela" and why that company connected it with a commercial arrangement with "Adriatic Marinas".
"The waste grit originating from 'Adriatic Marinas' Tivat is characterized as non-hazardous waste according to the findings of the Center for Ecotoxicological Research CETI doo. That waste, which was temporarily stored on the premises of the "Bijela" shipyard, was taken over by a legal entity that has the necessary permits for the management of the said waste", "Vijesti" from the EPA was told when asked to comment on this fact.
They confirmed that "a certain amount of non-dangerous grit originating from the former overhaul institute "Sava Kovačević-Arsenal", which is located in the area of the Adriatic shipyard "Bijela", was exported to the Republic of Ukraine".
"The amount of exported waste is 3.870,5 tons, the remaining amount remained on the premises of the Adriatic Shipyard 'Bijela', that is, on the premises of the concessionaire".
When "Arsenal" closed waste was dangerous, when it was taken over by "Adriatic Marinas" it became non-hazardous
However, although the EPA still claims today that the waste that ended up in Ukraine from "Porto Montenegro" through the company "Valgo", and the rest is now found in various places in Montenegro, is "non-hazardous material", according to the results of research carried out by an authorized laboratory of the Ukrainian Ministry of Economic Development, Trade and Agriculture, is actually extremely toxic and has a "pronounced mutagenic and carcinogenic effect".
This was announced three years ago by the research center of MANS, after an explosion broke out in the Ukrainian port of Kherson, where the field ship "FL Lydia" with 2019 tons of grit from "Porto Montenegro" arrived from "Bijela" at the end of 3.870,5 scandal.
"Valgo" previously obtained a permit from the EPA for the export of so-called "harmless contaminated grit", and the acceptance of the controversial material from Montenegro was carried out by the Ukrainian company "Firma Arka", with which "Valgo" concluded a special contract. After the analyzes of the Ukrainian state laboratory showed that the material is extremely toxic and dangerous, the local police launched an investigation against "Firma Ark", due to the suspicion that it submitted forged documents in the process of obtaining permits and thus violated the safety and environmental procedures in Ukraine.
The investigation was then initiated by the Basic State Prosecutor's Office in Podgorica, i.e. the prosecutor Slađana Španjević Volkov, but the Montenegrin public was never informed about the final outcome of this case.
According to the documentation that MANS received at the time based on a request for free access to information, the exporter of the material was the company "Valgo Montenegro - part of a foreign company" from Podgorica.
In the CETI analysis, conducted in May 2019, it is stated that the grit originating from the "Porto Montenegro" complex is non-hazardous waste, which is different in characteristics from the toxic grit from Bijela.
When asked how the subsequent findings of their Ukrainian colleagues on the analysis of the material that arrived in Kherson, which they classified as "hazardous waste, class 2 in accordance with the interstate standard DSTU2195-99", is so drastically different from theirs, from CETI replied to the research center of MANS that they analyzed the samples that "Valgo" delivered to them before export.
"Representatives of the French company personally sampled the analyzed grit and stated that it originates from the 'Porto Montenegro' location, which cannot be claimed to have been done according to an adequate procedure", CETI justified at the time, claiming that the analyzes of their Ukrainian colleagues also came to the conclusion " that these are completely different samples", or that different material arrived in Kherson compared to the one analyzed by CETI.
"What leads us to the conclusion that these are completely different samples is the result of the content of petroleum hydrocarbons (TPH). Namely, as is known, not one analyzed sample of waste grit sampled by CETI at the locations 'Bijela' and 'Porto Montenegro' was found to contain such a high TPH content. Namely, the TPH content in the grit did not exceed 0,5%, although based on the determined TPH content, a large part of the waste grit from the 'Bijela' Shipyard (sampled in 2015) and the waste grit from 'Porto Montenegro' (sampled in 2009) was characterized as hazardous waste. A high content of TPH (over 1%) was determined in soil samples from the location 'Bijela' in the period 2015-2016. year", she told MANS three years ago Danijela Šuković, Director of the Department for Laboratory Diagnostics and Radiation Protection at CETI.
CETI, however, did not then explain how the same waste grit from Tivat's "Arsenal" that CETI sampled in 2009 and which was then classified as hazardous waste, ten years later, when it was sampled from "Porto Montenegro", officially became non-hazardous waste.
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