On August 19th, many organizations from Cuenca and the surrounding area of the Kimsakocha páramo in Ecuador released a public statement (translated below) regarding a letter sent by Canadian company INV Metals to the Cantonal Council of the municipality of Cuenca (attached here in Spanish).
The...
On August 4th, Peruvian organization Derechos Humanos Sin Fronteras-Cusco (DHSF) published a note on its web site responding to a statements made by Hudbay Minerals, first to a local newspaper, then during its AGM, and finally in a letter written to the Business and Human Rights Centre, denying an...
Quebec’s independent Office of Public Hearings on the Environment (Bureau d’audiences publiques sur l’environnement) today made public its report on the state and management of asbestos and asbestos mining wastes in Quebec. The three-member Commission was mandated by Quebec’s Minister of the...
On July 14th, as havoc, panic, and fear caused by COVID-19 continues to sweep through the Ecuadorian Amazon, Canadian company Solaris Resources celebrated its new listing on the Toronto Stock Exchange’s Venture Exchange (TSX-V). It then proceeded to launch a two-week Twitter campaign championing...
On June 11, 2020, 21 lakes, streams and wetlands in northern Ontario were re-characterized as a mine tailings impoundment for the proposed Magino gold mine. This magical transformation took place through Schedule 2 of the Metal and Diamond Mining Effluent Regulation (MDMER) under the federal...
We wrote to Prime Minister Justin Trudeau as part of an international effort by 630 groups from around the world to draw world leaders' attention to the threat of investor lawsuits under the grossly unjust investor-state dispute settlement (ISDS) provisions of most international trade and...
On June 22, the Union of the Assemblies of the Communities of Chubut, Argentina (UACCH) officially launched its second “Popular Initiative” campaign, #NosDebenUnaLey (“they owe us a law”) to collect signatures from residents of the province to present a law which would protect water and the...
As early as 2010, landowners living along the coast of the Bismarck Sea in Papua New Guinea (PNG) sought and won an injunction to stop mine tailings from the Ramu nickel-cobalt mine from entering Basamuk Bay via a pipe system coming from the processing plant. This type of mine waste disposal is...
Guest blog by Rebekah Hayden, Rainforest Action Group
Resources company Currawong Resources has been granted a licence in the Wombat State Forest, about 70 km north of Melbourne, Australia, an area with 380 threatened species including brush-tailed phascogales and the dusky antechinus, a small...
This month the government of Papua New Guinea (PNG) proposed amendments to the Mining Act of 1992 to give the state a legal basis to “apply for a tenement and develop a mine,” stating that the 1992 Mining Act is “not very clear on State participation.” In particular, the amendment addresses the...
On June 8, International World Oceans Day, the Civil Society Forum of Tonga, a south Pacific island nation, published a strong statement in protection of their marine environment and calling for a moratorium on deep sea mining.
The statement emphasizes the “critical role” of the ocean in...
A group of legal experts has written to Ontario Minister of Energy, Northern Development and Mines, Greg Rickford, calling for an immediate halt to mineral staking and permitting processes in the province on account of difficulties remote Indigenous communities face in responding to consultation...
On April 20, in the middle of the COVID-19 crisis and a terrible drought, the Environmental Evaluation Commission of Valparaíso, Chile, approved Vizcachitas Holding's new drill program in the regional municipality of Putaendo, without citizen participation. Since 2007, Vizcachitas has been owned...
In a victory for the Tŝilhqot’in Nation, but also for the integrity of environmental assessment processes, the Supreme Court of Canada today dismissed Taseko Mines Ltd.’s application for leave to appeal last year’s Federal Court of Appeal (FCA) ruling about the federal assessment of Taseko’s...
On May 5, 2020, Barrick Gold held its annual general meeting (AGM) online. I attended (as a proxy shareholder) along with McDiyan Robert Yapari of Akali Tange Association in Porgera, Papua New Guinea, and raised questions regarding human rights abuses at the company’s Porgera mine in Papua New...
On May 5, 2020, Barrick Gold held its annual general meeting (AGM) online. I attended via a proxy and raised questions regarding human rights abuses at the company's North Mara mine in Tanzania.
Barrick is again facing legal action in the UK over accusations of excess use of force by public...