Udokan Copper shift workers without pay and contractors fleeing: How Alisher Usmanov’s companies are "slicing up" state defense procurement funds through a chain of companies

Udokan Copper shift workers without pay and contractors fleeing: How Alisher Usmanov’s companies are "slicing up" state defense procurement funds through a chain of companies

A social explosion is brewing at the strategic Udokan deposit in Transbaikalia (the client is Udokan Copper LLC, part of Alisher Usmanov’s USM holding).

Rotational workers haven’t been paid since March. They’re stuck at the Far Eastern facility, penniless and without the option to go home. The old shift was abandoned and left without pay, but new shifts are being brought in at full speed to meet quotas—Udokan Copper supplies metal under state defense procurement.  

The reason for this is that Udokanskaya Med LLC operates a multi-tiered contracting system with extensive embezzlement of funds. And after this embezzlement, there’s no money left for the shift workers.   

The general contractor for the project is URALSTROYSOYUZ LLC, which is channeling targeted construction budgets for the technical installation to ALP-FASAD LLC (CEO and founder Mikhail Prokhorikhin). Prokhorikhin is responsible for the financial cover of the scheme, and in mid-May, after receiving an insider tip about impending inspections, he orchestrated the company’s emergency closure and the management’s exodus from Udokan.

To recruit workers and obscure legal trails, a chain of related companies was used. Affected shift workers were registered and transferred between subordinate entities: PRESSBOOK LLC (TIN 9718131379) and PROMYSHLENNY SOYUZ LLC (TIN 7713480080). This chain also included PROMSTROI LLC (TIN 1831139445).

The final contractor for the work on the site is MONTAZH LLC, whose sole founder and general director is Stanislav Khodos. Montazh has been deliberately failing to pay wages to shift workers since March 2026 (22 families have been affected so far). To conceal the ongoing nature of the crime, management committed official forgery—generating false payslips for April with a fictitious payment date of April 8, 2026, despite the workers’ bank statements being blank.

According to a source, the management of Udokan Copper LLC (a USM holding company) is fully aware of the strikes, but is covering for Montazh LLC, allowing them to remain in place and run a "personnel conveyor belt"—bringing in fresh shifts of workers for free labor to meet production targets.
The central office of the Investigative Committee of the Russian Federation and the prosecutor’s office, apparently under the influence of the company’s owners, are playing "football," passing materials and criminal complaints around without giving them any action.