Back in the early 1990s, the Kumtor mine was meant to become newly independent Kyrgyzstan’s ticket to prosperity. Kumtor, the seventh largest gold deposit in the world at the time, became the first mine in Central Asia to be operated by a Western company. But as often is the case with resource extraction in developing countries, the only parties who ended up gaining from the country’s mineral wealth were big businesses and corrupt politicians.

A global coalition of 180+ community platforms, human rights and environmental organisations and academics from 36 nations is calling on the EU to abandon its plans to massively expand dirty mining as part of EU Green Deal and Green Recovery plans.

(Ottawa) Today, the Canadian Network on Corporate Accountability (CNCA) released draft model legislation that provides lawmakers with a blueprint for writing into Canadian law the corporate duty to respect human rights and the environment.

The draft model law, if adopted, would require Canadian companies to prevent human rights and environmental harm throughout their global operations and supply chains.

By Alain Deneault and Ugo Lapointe (Respectively, professor, author of "Canada: A New Tax Haven" and co-founder of Échec aux paradis fiscaux; co-founder of the Coalition pour que le Québec ait meilleure mine and coordinator at MiningWatch Canada.)

We, Brazilian and international civil society organizations, would like to express our great concern and indignation about the situation currently affecting 1,500 families of the Aurizona district, located in the municipality of Godofredo Viana, in the Amazon region of the Brazilian state of Maranhão.

The Metals Company Is a High Risk and Fundamentally Unsustainable Mining Venture: (London) Civil society organisations from across the globe have alerted shareholders to the financial, environmental and liability risks of investing in would-be deep sea mining company The Metals Company (TMC), as it seeks to become a publicly traded company on NASDAQ.

“DeepGreen Metals hopes to go public by combining with Sustainable Opportunities Acquisition Corp (SOAC). Shareholders in SOAC will shortly be invited to vote on approving the business combination and/or redeeming their investment.” explained Andy Whitmore, Finance Advocacy Officer, Deep Sea Mining Campaign.

Primary author: Mitchell Beer @Mitchellbeer

The Southern Africa Resource Watch (SARW) has lodged a notice of intention to defend a strategic lawsuit against public participation (SLAPP) brought against the organisation by a Canadian mining company, First Quantum Minerals (FQM) at the Gauteng High Court in Johannesburg. SARW is an independent, nonprofit organisation that monitors corporate and government’s conduct in the extraction of natural resources in Southern Africa. As part of its work, SARW assesses the extent to which these activities uplift the economic conditions of the SADC region's communities.

Vancouver-based mining company Pan American Silver held its Annual General Meeting (AGM) on May 12th: the final shareholder meeting for retiring founder and Board Chair Ross Beaty. To shareholders attending online, Beaty narrated a glowing chronicle of Pan American Silver’s socially and environmentally responsible history in Latin America.

(May 17, 2021) - British Columbia’s aim to become a choice supplier of metals and minerals needed to build a greener global economy will fail unless laws are changed, according to a new report released today. Legal reform and better enforcement are needed to force B.C. mining companies to live up to the claim that they are world leaders in social and environmental responsibility.