Newsletter 28: Summer 2010

On July 2, sixty days after the end of six weeks of public hearings, the federal review panel examining the proposed Prosperity Gold Copper Mine released its report. We were very pleased to see many of our concerns, as well as those of the Tsilhqot’in and Secwepemc Nations, Williams Lake Council of Canadians, Friends of Nemiah Valley, Cariboo Chilcotin Conservation Society and others were reflected in the report which concluded that:

The global mining industry uses high-risk mining practices and employs environmentally destructive mine waste disposal methods in Papua New Guinea (PNG) that are not tolerated in most other countries, including Canada. Canadian companies continue to severely affect major tropical rivers in PNG by using them as mine waste dumps. They have also dumped millions of tons of metal and chemical laden mine waste into PNG’s seas, and now, Nautilus Minerals out of Toronto plans to mine massive underwater sulphide deposits in the rich biologically diverse territorial waters of PNG.

In late November 2009, community activist Mariano Abarca Roblero was gunned down outside his home in the State of Chiapas in the south of Mexico. Mariano was a leader of the Mexican Network of People Affected by Mining (REMA). REMA had brought public attention to the region’s struggle against Canadian company Blackfire Exploration which has a barite mining project in Chiapas. Before his death, Mariano stated that, “If anything happens to me, I blame the Canadian mining company Blackfire.” Three men linked to Blackfire were quickly arrested in relation to his murder.