Obstacles – and Worse - Threaten Environmental Activist Determined to Speak Out

  ULAANBAATAR, Mongolia – When I met Sukhgerel Dugersuren it took about 30 seconds to know we would be having a serious interview with little light-hearted banter or small talk.

  For starters, she was a reluctant participant. The reason?  Sukhgerel [Sook-ge-rel], one of Mongolia’s most outspoken environmental and human rights activists, is on the government’s watch list. Her public activities are closely monitored.

  I let her set the ground rules. We met on a Tuesday morning at a small hotel in an obscure location. I paid for a private meeting room. Due to safety concerns she refused to discuss her family.  Also taboo were certain specifics about her on-going battle with an international mining company and the Mongolian government.

  In 2022 the country’s General Intelligence Agency [GIA} investigated Sukhgerel for conspiring with a foreign intelligence organization. Sukhgerel then told the story of a fellow activist serving a 10-year prison term for opposing development projects financed by neighboring China.

  The message was clear.

An Office of One

  The conflict began, Sukhgerel said, in 2009 when she helped create Oyu Tolgoi Watch [OT Watch] after the approval of a controversial $4 billion copper and gold mining project in South Mongolia involving a British-Australian company, Rio Tinto, and the Mongolian government.

  The project name: Oyu Tolgoi.

  The country’s largest ever development project singled a shift from Mongolia’s traditional income base of manufacturing and agriculture to tapping its vast mineral reserves. For some, the proposed mine was a huge win for a nation of 3 million still transitioning from 68 years as a socialist nation allied with the Soviet Union. But for the majority of Mongolians, half of whom are nomads, the benefits were negligible. Infrastructure improvements, a key promise to appease naysayers, were spotty, plagued by corruption and poor planning.

  Larger issues quickly emerged in 2013 once the mine was up and running. Oyu Tolgoi is located in the Gobi Desert, where water – required to run the mine – is already scarce. Nomadic herder communities, deprived of water and grasslands for their livestock, were forced to move or give up their livelihood altogether.  Many have relocated to the outskirts of Ulaanbaatar, where they struggle to maintain their way of life or have been forced to seek traditional employment.

  Non-environmental issues surfaced as well.

  Mining jobs pay well but, according to Sukhgerel, a significant number of the employees at Oyu Tolgoi are not Mongolian.

  “They imported [cheaper] labor from China,” she said. “It was one of the contentious provisions in the agreement between the mining company and the government.”

  More recently, the miners’ labor organization has sought support from OT Watch on issues they’ve been unable to resolve themselves.

  “The miners are overworked. And they’re not getting paid for overtime,” she said.

  Adding to their woes, the Ministry of Labor enacted new policies that sharply decreased wages for miners and employees at other Mongolian companies.

  At that point in our discussion, it became clear that her original role as OT Watch president - to monitor activities at the Oyu Tolgoi mine - had expanded considerably. And that Sukhgerel’s actions had aggravated the wrong people.

  During its probe in 2022, she said GIA investigators searched her office, collecting documents and taking her mobile phone and laptop, which they later returned.

  “They interrogated me for many hours.”

  Aside from the stress of being the center of a high-profile criminal investigation, the impact on OT Watch was severe. Sukhgerel’s staff resigned and the group’s personal service contracts cancelled.

  “Since then, I’m the only one in the office,” she said.

  Which led to the question: Where does she find the time and energy?

Born to Act

  Her answer surprised: “My nickname growing up was ‘Crazy.’

  Not, she said, because she was wild or out of control. But, rather, the zeal in which she tackled any endeavor.

  “Honestly, I think it’s in the genes.”

  As promised, she was guarded in discussing her family. Off the record, Sukhgerel revealed a significant and impressive lineage. On the record, she would only say that her father worked in international relations, that her mother was a journalist, and that she has an unspecified number of children.

  Born in 1954, Sukhgerel was raised during the country’s socialist years. In Mongolia that meant she was recruited in high school by a government diplomacy group promoting exchange with other countries. The organization covered her university expenses and then hired her upon her graduation.

  When the Soviet Union dissolved in late 1991, neighboring Russia’s presence in Mongolia quickly dissipated, including the withdrawal of all its troops. On the downside, the excellent former Russian schools transitioned from free to tuition-based. Administrators would only accept U.S. dollars. Sukhgerel, needing to finance her children’s education, was hired as an interpreter for the United States Agency for International Development. [In her previous job she spent six months in London learning English.] That stint led to full-time employment with USAID.

  Sukhgerel spent 13 years there: She loved the job. For years, the organization supported Mongolia’s development in tourism, cashmere manufacturing, meat production and other traditional industries. In 2001, geologists discovered massive deposits of high-grade copper and gold which would become the Oyu Tolgoi mine. USAID then shifted to supporting the new industry believing it would be a faster way to economic success.

  For Sukhgerel, the decision shattered the idealistic attitude she had working with the agency.

  “I felt [the traditional economic model] was something that could last forever if you maintained it,” she said.

  Mining, on the other hand, not only had a definitive shelf life, the environmental damage left behind might be irreparable: Oyu Tolgoi could be a 60-year project.

  So, she quit her job.

  “Even though I’m a 5th generation city girl,” she said, “all Mongolians were taught from a young age not to disturb a single stone from the ground, and that digging land was a sin. This goes back to our nomadic roots. It’s at the core of the Mongolian value system.”

The End Game

  While Sukhgerel worked at USAID, she was unaware that an active anti-mine movement was already afoot.

  “I was not watching what was happening outside,” she explained. “Then, after I left, I found out there were a lot of voices against the project.”

  The debate raged for eight years before the project was green-lighted.  At the time, Sukhgerel had been working as a consultant, monitoring media coverage of the country’s volatile 2008 national election. Her role changed to human rights activist after a government crackdown on election protestors sent hundreds to prison.

  She also began counseling her anti-mining friends on how to proceed when it became clear one of the world’s largest copper mining projects could not be stopped.

  “I told them the only thing they could do was compliance monitoring of mining operations to make sure the mining company met international environmental and human rights standards.”

  Her friends liked Sukhgerel’s thinking – compliance monitoring was a new concept in Mongolia - but had a different idea.

  “They told me, ‘We’ll set up the monitoring organization and you run it,’” she said.

  Sixteen years later, OT Watch is synonymous with Sukhgerel Dugersuren. Along the way she’s followed her own advice, partnering with sympathetic, independent organizations, mainly in Canada, the U.K. and Europe. Grievances are filed through these groups against Rio Tinto and banking organizations underwriting the mining project when improprieties are uncovered.

  She recalled OT Watch’s first victory in 2013.  Through meticulous research, Sukhgerel found that Rio Tinto failed to comply with standards set by one of its lenders, the International Finance Corp. As a result of the successful complaint, Rio Tinto had to compensate the nomads who had lost access to water and pastureland near the Oyu Tolgoi site.

  I asked if this win had given her some measure of satisfaction.

  Her answer was a resounding, “No!”

  Showing emotion for the first time, Sukhgerel explained that an additional 14 mega-mining and hydro projects are in various planning stages. She admitted to progress on thwarting two of the hydro projects, another reason for her being on the government’s watch list.

  “I’m being blamed for stopping both.”

  While Sukhgerel no doubt has her enemies among Mongolia’s pro-development crowd, she can counter with Rio Tinto’s shady history as an investment partner. In 1989, the company was booted out of Papa New Guinea after an uprising by locals over environmental damages from mining and unequal distribution of profits. Five years ago, in western Australia, the company destroyed Aboriginal caves dating to the last Ice Age during an iron ore mine expansion project, according to a BBC report.

  In June. Riot Tinto agreed to pay $138 million to settle a class action lawsuit which accused the company of misleading investors about underground expansion delays and cost overruns at Oyu Tolgoi.

  Sukhgerel could have gone on, describing other battles, but we decided I had heard enough. I asked about a typical day at the office. She said she bounces from one meeting to the next - mostly phone or video chats - answers emails and continues her never ending research.

  Now in her early 70s, she admits to being tired. An exit strategy is in the works.

  “I need to start fundraising so I can hire three to four people, train them and then retire,” Sukhgerel said.

  Her current persona non grata status and dwindling grant money related to Trump administration policies has made that task more difficult.

  After spending two hours with “Crazy,” I felt confident she’ll find a way.

Editor’s note: Third in a series from a reporting trip to Mongolia July 27-August 2, 2025

______________________________________________

Reported and written by: George J. Tanber

Edited by: Michael Gordon

Photo editor: David Kozy