The Karin, a 400-foot-long (120-meter-long) cargo ship, sat moored this week on Ireland’s boggy River Shannon estuary. Soon it set sail for Russia laden with a white powder that can be forged into weapons vital to Moscow’s war on Ukraine.

Alumina, the key ingredient in aluminum, goes into everything from toothpaste and lipstick to missiles and drones. A Russian-owned plant in southern Ireland is Europe’s biggest alumina refinery and regularly sends shiploads of the substance directly to St. Petersburg and other Russian ports.

Almost five years into Moscow’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine, alumina has escaped European sanctions intended to hobble Russia’s economy. That leaves the refinery in Aughinish free to send its product to Russia, where some ends up in weapons, experts say.

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[–] Zedstrian@sopuli.xyz 10 points 14 hours ago (1 child)

He said in July it had been impossible to prove Rusal’s assertion that alumina from Ireland is only used to make aluminum for export from Russia.

Even if it were only used in aluminum exports (and it's not), cutting off another source of it would bring the Russian government closer to needing to ration its remaining supply between military and civilian goods.

“It’s too big a business for them to close it down,” said retired docker Joe Hanlon. “Too much employment for the government to get involved.”

Given that the factory has plenty of non-Russian customers, bringing up the notion of 'closing it down' is needlessly muddying the waters in favor of retaining Russia as a client.

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[–] aeronmelon@lemmy.world [S] 4 points 13 hours ago

“We can’t shut it down.” Is a false dichotomy where Russia is involved, but there’s another angle to this involving how polluted and unhealthy the factory is making the air for nearby towns. Those people are lobbying to have it completely shut down for that reason alone.

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