I have been showing some friends around KC today and have little time for anything else. So, you will get no commentary here from me except to say, the multitude will fight back against the Canadian mineral robbing, ecology destroying, people removing representatives of global capital. Count on it.
The following is from The Flower of the Word Will Not Die.
The “Mining Truce” in Chiapas at the Point of Ending
** The federal government has delivered 97 concessions to trans- nationals, the majority Canadian
** They have terms in effect for 50 years and in diverse cases pass over environmental regulations
By: Hermann Bellinghausen, Envoy
San Cristóbal de Las Casas, Chiapas, July 5, 2012
Everything indicates that the truce the out-going Chiapas government conceded for mining exploitation is at the point of ending. In this state the federal government delivered 97 concessions to a group of transnationals, the majority Canadian, for periods of up to 50 years, frequently passing over environmental norms. That will occur with the Titan of the Andes Mine, in the coastal municipality of Acacoyagua.
Even against negative opinion by the National Commission for Natural protected Areas (Conanp), the delegation from the Secretary of Environment and Natural Resources (Semarnat), headed by the biologist Ricardo Frías López, it approved the establishment and operation of mining. It thus disposed of resolution DF/CHIS/ SGPA/UGA/DIRA/2387/12, on May 23, which on Semarnat’s electronic page appears with the bin number 07/MP-0001/09/11. According to a source consulted, who asked for anonymity, “authorizing a work of that magnitude in the Sierra Madre of Chiapas, one of the states with the country’s greatest biodiversity, is a flagrant violation of nature and of all the conservation treaties about biodiversity signed by Mexico.”
Conamp had considered that a work of that magnitude would impact directly on the mangrove ecosystems in La Encrucijada Biosphere Reserve. Now, with its polemic authorization, Semarnat benefits a mining company linked with the Salinas Group of TV Azteca. Fortuitously, the largest number of virtual (recently elected) legislators linked to the television network corresponds to Chiapas.
For its part, the Mexican Network of those Affected by Mining (Rema) and the Mesoamerican Movement against the Extractive Mining Model (C4) announced in May the report Depredation in the hands of Canadian Mining Companies,where they maintain that “important international companies operate in different stages of the exploitation process.” Two already have functioning mines, “while the rest continue in stages of exploration or construction.” They look for gold and silver, but also extract barite, titanium, magnetite and copper. It’s appropriate to remember that the extractive suspension followed the 2009 murder of Mariano Abarca, opponent of mining in Chicomuselo and a member of Rema.
One of the principal companies is Blackfire Exploration Ltd, with headquarters in Alberta, Canada, which has for a slogan “Exploring Aggressively and Developing Chiapas.” Through subsidiaries or intermediaries it has acquired 27, 412 hectares. It has opened a barite mina in Chicomuselo and this year plans to open two more in the Sierra. At its turn, Linear Gold Corp shows it has exploration rights on 198, 416 hectares and exploits a gold mine through two intermediaries in Ixuatán, in the northern part of the state. Among its other projects is a gold mine in Motozintla.
According to Rema and C4, there are four other companies that, although they have not started to exploit, have concessions for exploration and in certain cases exploitation in 31 municipalities, the majority in the Sierra. They are the Canadian companies Radius Gold Corp (103, 210 hectares), Fronteer Development Group (208, 392), New Gold Inc (246, 249) and the Chilean copper company Codelco (12, 831), which in 2009 “was the mining company that registered the greatest increase as to the production of copper,” according to the Mining Directory of Chile.
Of the 97 total concessions, 37 expire in 2050, and four more in 2054 in Escuintla, Pijijiapan and Solusuchiapa, “where the majority of mining concessions are until 2057. 17 permits expire in 2056 in Amatenango del Valle, Coapilla, Copainalá, Motozintla, Pichucalco, Rayón, Siltepec, Tapachula and Villa Comaltitlán. Of them, nine belong to Linear Gold with a total of 120, 744 hectares.
The permits for 11 mines would terminate in 2057, after 50 years in Ocozocoautla, Chicomuselo, Angel Albino Corzo, Venustiano Carranza, Villa Flores, Motozintla, Escuintla and Mazapa de Madero. On the other hand, the Canadian Radius Gold/Geo-metals of the North is the owner of 103, 210 hectares, with six projects in Ocozocoautla, Chicomuselo, Angel Albino Corzo, Venustiano Carranza and Villa Flores.
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