NOVOSIBIRSK, August 23 - RAPSI. Nikolai Kuznetsov, the coordinator of an activist group, has filed a lawsuit against the investigative bodies that have refused to open a criminal case into a 2008 oil leak near Novosibirsk, Kuznetsov told RIA Novosti on Tuesday.

The oil leaked from the Omsk-Irkutsk pipeline owned by Transsibneft in the Novosibirsk Region in 2008. Transsibneft claims the oil leak amounted to seven cubic meters including one cubic meter that reached the Balta River. The company contained the rest. The environmental damage was estimated at over 4.2 million rubles ($144,408).

The swamp land is still covered, in some places, with film which looks like oil, said a RIA Novosti correspondent who visited the site in the fall of 2010.

The Novosibirsk Region Natural Resources Department has stated that Balta water in the area of the leak is good for farming and fishing. The land along the pipeline is also suitable for planting, the department said.

RAPSI News Service