[Title translation and summary translation of the original Russian language article provided by Business & Human Rights Resource Centre] Since August 2011 Agip KCO has been conducting hydro testing as part of its North Caspian project on industrial development of the Kashagan field. This includes testing and washing of pipes at the gas processing plant "Bolashak" in Karabatan. Every day 300 to 600 cubic metres of drinking water are used for the testing which constitutes almost one third of the daily drinking water consumed by the 220,000 residents of Atyrau city. Residents of Makatskyj district are already experiencing a critical shortage of drinking water. However, Agip KCO does not have a permit to use drinking water. According to Kazakh law, oil companies should use service (industrial) water because, during hydro testing, a lot of toxic chemicals are added to it. According to our source, the company had been dumping toxic water in local salt steppe lakes at night for five months. This directly threatens the health and lives of Atyrau residents. Having already dumped 120 thousand tonnes of contaminated water in the lakes, the company later began to dump the contaminated water in the city’s sewage system during the daytime. We sent an enquiry to the company regarding these issues, including a number of specific questions related to the hydro testing and toxic water dumping, but did not receive a response. [The Business & Human Rights Resource Centre invited Eni and North Capsian Operating Company (joint venture ConocoPhillips, Eni, ExxonMobil, INPEX, KazMunaiGaz, Shell & Total] to respond. The companies' responses are below.]