CANADIAN DIAMONDS

North Arrow collects Naujaat bulk sample to test for fancy coloured diamonds

Northern Miner Staff | August 19, 2021 | 

Selection of yellow diamonds recovered from North Arrow Minerals’ Naujaat project in Nunavut. Credit: North Arrow Minerals

North Arrow Minerals (TSXV: NAR) has completed a 2,000-tonne bulk sample from its Naujaat diamond project in Nunavut, a key step toward discovering if the project has enough fancy coloured diamonds – with a high enough value – to justify development.


North Arrow has already delineated a resource for the Q1-4 kimberlite at Naujaat, located only 7 km from tidewater near the community of Naujaat. Q1-4 hosts 48.8 million inferred tonnes grading 53.6 carats per hundred tonnes for 26.1 million carats. The bulk sample is aimed at determining the size distribution and character of a population of potentially high value fancy yellow to orange yellow diamonds found at Q1-4.

North Arrow expects processing of the sample to begin in the fourth quarter.

“Bulk sample collection from the Q1-4 kimberlite is now complete, with field crews having delivered 2,500 bulk sample bags of kimberlite to our laydown near the community of Naujaat,” said Ken Armstrong, president and CEO of North Arrow. “At approximately 2,000 tonnes, the 2,500 bags represent the high end of our anticipated tonnage range for the program and we look forward to loading the sample onto the annual Naujaat sealift in September for shipment to the processing laboratory.”

The C$5.6 million bulk sample program is funded by Burgundy Diamond Mines (ASX: BDM).

While North Arrow has made several diamond discoveries in Canada over the past decade, including the Pikoo discovery in Saskatchewan, it has been difficult to raise funds for exploration.

Last year, the junior signed an option agreement with Burgundy (then known as EHR Resources). In return for funding the bulk sample, Burgundy will earn a 40% interest in Naujaat. If the results are positive, the company can earn another 20% interest by funding a larger, 10,000-tonne bulk sample.

(This article first appeared in The Northern Miner)

AFGHAN NEWS

LGBT+ Afghans desperate to escape amid Taliban takeover

The LGBT+ community in Afghanistan now fear more violence under the Taliban rule as many try to evacuate.

The New Arab Staff & Agencies
21 August, 2021

LGBT+ Afghans fear for their lives under Taliban rule [Getty]

It was never easy being gay or transgender in Afghanistan. Now it could be deadly, according to LGBT+ Afghans, whose fear of violence under the Taliban is driving a frantic bid to escape.

But how any evacuation might work is another matter, with scant practical support coming from overseas and even less hope that Islamist militants will let them into the airport.

"If I find a visa and a country gives me permission to leave, of course, I will risk everything to get out," said one gay Afghan student, whose name was withheld for his protection.

"Any country, but not here. Living here means nothing for us."

The odds are stacked against an escape as the 21-year-old hides indoors, paralysed by fear of what might happen on the street, with few exit routes open amid chaotic airport scenes.

Nor is it clear where LGBT+ Afghans might be welcome to set up home or whether sexuality or gender identity are criteria for automatic asylum in many countries around the world.

Canada has pledged to resettle 20,000 Afghans, explicitly including LGBT+ people in its commitment.

In offering such clear assurance, Canada is an outlier.

Irish media has reported that LGBT+ people will also be among its 150 Afghan refugees brought to the country. Ireland's foreign ministry did not respond to a request for comment.

But in other Western democracies, including the United States and Europe, there was no such clarity.

On Monday, the day after Kabul fell, U.S. President Joe Biden wrote a memo granting $500 million for "unexpected urgent refugee and migration needs of refugees, victims of conflict, and other persons at risk" in the tumult.

U.S. State Department spokesperson Ned Price told reporters on Tuesday that the United States would "bring to safety... vulnerable Afghans" without specifying who. Asked if this covered LGBT+ Afghans, the State Department declined comment.

Britain says it will welcome up to 5,000 Afghans under year one of a resettlement programme that will prioritise women, girls and religious and other minorities.

Again, it made no mention of LGBT+ Afghans and did not respond to a Thomson Reuters Foundation request for comment.

Many European leaders are wary of accepting any migrants - of any type - and some countries, including Australia, have explicitly rejected an Afghan influx.

Turkey is bolstering its border walls with Iran, which neighbours Afghanistan, expressly to keep out Afghan migrants.

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How 'Allahu Akbar' became a rallying cry against the Taliban


Secrets and Fear

Rainbow Railroad, a Canadian-based LGBT+ advocacy group, has urged governments to help gay and trans Afghan refugees.

"Public attitudes...towards LGBTQI+ people are extremely negative, which leads members of the LGBTQ+ community to keep their gender identity and sexual orientation a secret in fear of harassment, intimidation, persecution, and death," it said.

"Now, with the return of the Taliban, there is an understandable fear that the situation will worsen."

U.S. novelist Nemat Sedat, a gay Afghan-American who left his homeland aged 5, then taught at an Afghan university from 2012 to 2013, told the Thomson Reuters Foundation he had been contacted by more than 100 LGBT+ Afghans desperate to flee.

"People are messaging me, telling me 'What can we do? We're going to get exterminated. The Taliban are going to weed us out and kill us,'" Sedat said in a video call.

Sedat said he was working with an American based in Kabul and lobbying his congressman to try and arrange a flight out.

Contacted over WhatsApp, the American confirmed he was at Kabul airport, but said the situation was "really bad" and he was unsure even how to get LGBT+ people safely through the city.

Chaos has swamped the airport, with reports of stampedes, Taliban fighters turning back Afghans with travel documents and women throwing their babies over the wall to U.S. soldiers.

Since Sunday, 12 people have been killed in and around the airport, according to NATO and Taliban officials.

(Reuters)

After Afghanistan, the Pax Americana is over – as is Nato. About time too

Biden’s Afghan chaos means Europe can no longer rely on him. Let’s hope a more balanced security relationship emerges

President Biden comments on the evacuation of American citizens and vulnerable Afghans, on 20 August. Photograph: Chris Kleponis/UPI/REX/Shutterstock

Simon Tisdall
Sat 21 Aug 2021 

THE GUARDIAN

The North Atlantic measurably widened last week. The more Joe Biden tried to shift blame for the Afghan chaos, the bigger the gulf with America’s UK and European allies grew. This US president, who preaches the virtues of multilateralism yet acted on his own, has done more in a few weeks to undermine the western alliance than Donald Trump ever did with all his bluster.


After the chaos in Kabul, is the American century over?

All things considered, this may not be such a bad outcome. A reckoning was long overdue. The Bush-Blair invasion of Iraq was a historic mistake. Barack Obama’s Syria cop-out was shaming, for the opposite reason. Now the hugely costly 20-year Afghan intervention is ending in calamity, more refugee chaos, and the threat of renewed terrorism which, once again, will principally affect Europe.
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If this is where US leadership leads, who needs it? When America plays global policeman, as self-described “liberal-neocons” say it must, too many people in too many places end up screaming “I can’t breathe!” America is either woefully absent – or its domineering engagement ends in tears. The cycle repeats. Fears grow that US allies are being dragged into another “forever war”, this time with China.

Selfish American behaviour during the pandemic was not untypical. Trump caused untold harm through denial and inaction. Biden’s administration has endangered millions by vaccine-hoarding. Afghanistan today is a geopolitical expression of this familiar phenomenon. Trump did not invent America First. Biden is merely its latest exponent.

The president’s televised speech last Monday was truly shocking to non-Americans. His undeserved contempt for Afghan forces and obliviousness to the sacrifices of Nato allies smacked of arrogance and betrayal. His claim that nation-building was never a US aim was grotesquely untrue. “Afghanistan was the ultimate nation-building mission,” George W Bush wrote in his 2010 memoir, Decision Points. “We had a moral obligation to leave behind something better.” Hear that, Joe?
The enemies of democracy have been strengthened. There’s no doubt Afghans are paying a terrible price.

Yet it was Biden’s apparent repudiation of the traditional US leadership role that rocked British and European establishments. “Endless military deployments of US forces” in overseas conflicts were not in the national interest, he declared. Afghanistan was solely about defending the “homeland”. For those raised in a world defined by American power and ringed by its permanent bases, this was stunning.

Armin Laschet, Angela Merkel’s choice to succeed her as Germany’s chancellor, called the withdrawal “the biggest debacle Nato has suffered since its founding”. Conservative MP Tom Tugendhat, an Afghan war veteran, decried “Britain’s biggest foreign policy disaster since Suez” – another fiasco, incidentally, to which the US contributed.

Hapless Boris Johnson meanwhile snuffles about like a pig stuck in the middle. Britain’s prime minister has shamelessly sucked up to Washington since burning his EU boats. Now, furious ministers and generals must bite their tongues – for fear of damaging the wider, precarious “special” relationship. That Brexit price-tag just keeps rising.

The obvious lesson for European leaders, and even Johnson, is that Washington cannot be relied upon, if it ever could. Afghanistan is the latest proof that the US, like every other nation state, ultimately acts in its own interest – as it perceives this at a particular moment in time – no matter what solemn blood promises have been made.

In short, American exceptionalism always was illusory. Greater European self-reliance is the only logical answer.

Post-1945, it suited the US to entrench its newfound physical and economic sway over Europe, and thereby contain its Soviet superpower rival. The resulting Truman doctrine, while championing universal freedoms, essentially pivoted on self-interest. Altruism had little to do with it. Now, with US power declining relative to China and new challenges arising, self-interest dictates re-evaluation, re-prioritising, and retrenchment.

This is the broader context in which the Afghan withdrawal should be understood – since Biden’s successors are unlikely to act very differently. EU states, with or without Britain, must finally make good on years of talk about building credible, independent European defence and security capabilities. In short, French president Emmanuel Macron is right, and Merkel is wrong.

All the same, it’s a mistake to keep beating up Biden. For sure, the withdrawal is dreadfully mismanaged. The US could and should have kept a minimal presence at the Bagram airbase, for deterrence purposes. The enemies of democracy have certainly been strengthened. There’s no doubt Afghans are paying a terrible price.

But calling time on the post-9/11 “forever wars”, as part of this necessary reformation of US foreign policy, was inevitable and unavoidable.

If Biden succeeds in his stated aims, future American global leadership will prioritise diplomacy, soft-power tools, economic and financial levers, technological advantage, intelligence-gathering and specialised defensive capabilities over brute military force, full-scale invasions, and indefinite armed occupations. Biden officials call it “smart power” for a new era. This is surely progress of a kind.

The shift is symbolised by Biden’s ending of Bush’s “global war on terror”. A policy review is expected to recommend reducing the worldwide US counter-terrorism footprint, which has grown exponentially since 2001. The new policy will reportedly look beyond Islamist terror to the rising domestic threat from far-right extremists.

A moratorium on drone strikes has been in place since January. New Pentagon guidelines will raise the threshold for launching military action and require field commanders to do more to avoid civilian casualties. It’s too late for Afghanistan, where thousands of non-combatants died. But it could reduce future bloodshed.

The Afghan project failed. The tarnished age of Pax Americana and the “endless military deployments” Biden deplored is thankfully drawing to a close. Nato – discredited, ill-led, and taken for granted – has had its day, too. A more balanced, more respectful US-Europe security relationship is required. Without it, there may be no western alliance left to lead.

Taliban’s return clouds long-delayed plans for Afghanistan’s resources

Reuters | August 19, 2021 | 

Afghan soldiers from 215 Corps take aim at Taliban insurgents. (Image courtesy of Al Jazeera | Flickr.)

China could look to steal a march on wary western nations in developing resource projects in a Taliban-led Afghanistan, state media and industry sources say, but the necessary infrastructure will take years to build and security issues may well intervene.


Afghanistan’s vast mineral wealth – including large reserves of lithium, a key component in electric vehicles – has been trumpeted as a path to economic independence. But instability has repeatedly hampered past projects, dousing most foreign investor interest.

“I wouldn’t and couldn’t invest in Afghanistan with the Taliban running the country. It’s lawless,” said Ben Cleary, the chief executive of Tribeca Investment Partners, which runs a global natural resources fund and finances mining projects.

He said he couldn’t see any companies listed in Australia, Canada or the United States having a mandate to buy assets there, adding: “China would be the only potential buyer.”

Asked about prospects for investment under the Taliban, the Chinese foreign ministry said lasting peace and stability were fundamental for potential investors from all nations.

While noting security concerns, state-owned tabloid Global Times said on Tuesday that China could contribute to post-war reconstruction in Afghanistan and resume stalled projects.

Citing an unnamed Metallurgical Corp of China (MCC) source, it also said the company would consider reopening Afghanistan’s largest copper project once the situation stabilised, and international recognition of the Taliban regime, including by the Chinese government, took place.

A consortium of MCC and Jiangxi Copper took out a 30-year lease for the project, the Mes Aynak mine, in 2008 but it remains undeveloped.

One MCC source told Reuters this week it could take five to six years to build infrastructure for mining there but the project could not go anywhere while safety concerns lingered.

Eight security force members were killed in a Taliban attack on a checkpoint at the mine last year.

“It is impossible to push forward the project without a safe environment,” the source said.

MCC and Jiangxi Copper did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
China, Taliban meeting

There has been no official recognition of the Taliban, though China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi hosted Mullah Baradar, chief of the group’s political office, in Tianjin last month.

The foreign ministry said it noted that the Taliban had expressed a commitment to creating a good environment for foreign investors.

“We hope that the situation in Afghanistan will transition smoothly, and an open and inclusive political structure will be established so that no terrorist organisation will be able to take advantage of it,” the ministry added in a statement to Reuters.

Concerns about potential human rights abuses under a Taliban regime will likely be another barrier to investment in resources that also include gold, natural gas, uranium, bauxite, coal, iron ore and rare earths – sectors in which China has few if any Afghan projects.

“I think most of the world’s financial system is applying some fairly stringent ESG (environmental, social and governance) lenses now over investments in that (resources) sector,” said ANZ Senior Commodity Strategist Daniel Hynes in Sydney.

“It would be a pretty difficult project to get underway considering all the hurdles.”
CNPC pulls out

At least one Chinese project in Afghanistan will not be going forward.

State-owned China National Petroleum Corp (CNPC) is in the process of exiting its oil project in the northern Amu Darya Basin, a company official told Reuters this week.

“It’s not a big investment. CNPC sees the investment as a failure,” said the official, without elaborating.

The state energy major began producing oil there in 2012 under a 25-year contract but stopped work the following year as plans to refine the oil in Turkmenistan hit a snag.

The project had also come under attack from local militants.

CNPC declined to comment.

An Indian consortium led by Steel Authority of India (SAIL) is also pulling out.

It was awarded rights to build a steel mill and develop iron ore mines in Afghanistan with a total investment of $11 billion in 2011.

“SAIL’s inroads into Afghanistan were purely a political commitment and they were promised a steel plant,” an official at SAIL with direct knowledge of the matter told Reuters on Thursday.

The project had been shelved due to poor iron-ore quality, lack of security and a threat to employees’ safety, the official, who declined to be named, said.

SAIL and the Indian government did not immediately reply to requests for comment.

Afghanistan’s Ministry of Mines and Petroleum did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

(By Tom Daly, Shivani Singh, Aizhu Chen, Melanie Burton, Neha Arora, Beijing Newsroom, Min Zhang and Muyu Xu; Editing by Christian Schmollinger)

 RIGHT WING BLAIRITE

Labour Party leader Keir Starmer says invasion of Afghanistan ‘brought stability’ & ‘reduced terrorist threat’

18 Aug, 2021 12:11

(L) Keir Starmer. © Reuters / BERESFORD HODGE; (R) Kabul, Afghanistan. © AFP / Wakil Kohsar

UK Labour Party leader Keir Starmer argued in Parliament on Wednesday that the invasion of Afghanistan “brought stability” to the region and reduced the threat of terrorism in the West – days after the Taliban took over Kabul.

During a House of Commons debate over the withdrawal of US and UK troops from Afghanistan this week, which led to the Taliban quickly taking over the country, Prime Minister Boris Johnson declared that the UK would “judge” the new “regime on the choices it makes and by its actions rather than its words.”

Starmer, meanwhile, condemned the “disastrous week” and “staggering complacency from our government about the Taliban threat,” before attempting to argue that the 2001 invasion of Afghanistan following the 9/11 attacks was meaningful and worthwhile.

Telling British soldiers and their families that “your sacrifice was not in vain,” Starmer said the invasion “brought stability, reduced the terrorist threat and enabled progress.

“We are all proud of what you did,” the Labour Party leader continued, acknowledging that “many returned with life-changing injuries” while hundreds more “didn’t return at all,” before adding, “Your sacrifice deserves better than this and so do the Afghan people.”

During the nearly 20-year war in Afghanistan, 47,245 Afghan civilians died, along with 66,000 members of the Afghan military and police, 3,846 US contractors, nearly 2,500 US soldiers, 457 British military personnel, 444 aid workers and 72 journalists.

Trillions of dollars were spent by the US on the war, while the UK government is estimated to have spent between £22 billion and £40 billion (between $30 billion and $55 billion).

In recent days, news outlets and analysts have identified the Taliban as the greatest beneficiary of the money spent by the US on Afghanistan, noting that not only did the Taliban manage to take Kabul in a matter of hours, but the organization also captured billions of dollars’ worth of weaponry, ammunition, helicopters, ground vehicles and even drones that were left behind by departing troops.

The vast majority of British combat troops left Afghanistan in 2014 but 750 remained to maintain a presence in the country. Former prime minister Tony Blair and his Labour Party government eagerly supported the invasion of Afghanistan following the 9/11 attacks and the UK was soon involved in the allied US campaign, with Blair desperate for the UK to be among the first nations involved in the bombing of Kabul

Pax Americana died in Kabul

Opinion: Brahma Chellaney lays out the end of Pax Americana, as the fall of Kabul damages US credibility, stymies anti-terror efforts, and paves the way for Chinese expansion.

Brahma Chellaney
18 Aug, 2021

An Afghan security personnel stands guard at the site a day after a car bomb explosion in Kabul on 4 August, 2021. On 15 August, the Afghan government collapsed and the Taliban took Kabul. [Getty]


The terrorist takeover of Afghanistan, following President Joe Biden's precipitous and bungling military exit, has brought an ignoble end to America's longest war. This is a watershed moment that will be remembered for formalising the end of the long-fraying Pax Americana and bringing down the curtain on the West's long ascendancy.

At a time when its global preeminence was already being severely challenged by China, the US may never recover from the blow this strategic and humanitarian disaster delivers to its international credibility and standing. The message it delivers to US allies is that they count on America's support when they most need it at their own peril.

After all, the Afghanistan catastrophe unfolded after the US threw its ally - the Afghan government - under the bus and got into bed with the world's deadliest terrorists, the Taliban. President Donald Trump first struck a Faustian bargain with them, and then the Biden administration rushed to execute the military exit dictated by the deal, even though the Taliban had been openly violating the agreement.

"The US may never recover from the blow this strategic and humanitarian disaster delivers to its international credibility and standing"

The dramatic collapse of the Afghan defences and then the government was directly linked to the US betrayal. Biden admits Trump "drew US forces down to a bare minimum of 2,500" in Afghanistan. By refusing to retain that small military footprint and by ordering a rapid exit at the onset of the annual fighting season, Biden pulled the rug out from under the Afghan military's feet, thus facilitating the Taliban's sweep.

The US had trained and equipped the Afghan forces not to play an independent role but to rely on American and NATO capabilities for a host of battlefield imperatives - from close air support, including drones for situational awareness, to keeping US-supplied weapon systems operational. Biden's calamitous troop pullout without a transition plan to sustain the Afghans' combat capabilities unleashed a domino effect, with 8,500 NATO forces and some 18,000 US military contractors also withdrawing and leaving the Afghan military in the lurch.

As former CIA Director General David Petraeus has explained, ever since US combat operations in Afghanistan ended on January 1, 2015, Afghan soldiers had been bravely "fighting and dying for their country" until the US suddenly ditched them this summer, mortally compromising Afghan defences.

This assessment is reinforced by the number of military deaths: Since the US combat role ended more than six and a half years ago, Afghan security forces lost tens of thousands of soldiers, while the Americans suffered just 99 fatalities, many in non-hostile incidents.

This is not the first time the US has dumped its allies - or even the first time in recent memory. In the fall of 2019, the US abruptly abandoned its Kurdish allies in northern Syria, leaving them at the mercy of a Turkish offensive.

But in Afghanistan, the US sowed the wind and reaped the whirlwind. Its self-inflicted defeat and humiliation have resulted from a failure of political, not military, leadership. Biden, ignoring conditions on the ground, overruled his top military generals in April and ordered all US troops to return home. Now, two decades of American war in Afghanistan have culminated with the enemy riding triumphantly back to power.

"The geopolitical implications of the US defeat in Afghanistan are much more significant globally than the American defeat in Vietnam"

Whereas 58,220 Americans (largely draftees) were killed in Vietnam, 2,448 US soldiers (all volunteers) died over the course of 20 years in Afghanistan. Yet, the geopolitical implications of the US defeat in Afghanistan are much more significant globally than the American defeat in Vietnam.

The Pakistan-reared Taliban may not have a global mission, but their militaristic theology of violent Islamism makes them a critical link in an international jihadist movement that whips hostility toward non-Sunni Muslims into nihilistic rage against modernity. The Taliban's recapture of power will energise and embolden other violent groups in this movement, helping to deliver the rebirth of global terror.

In the Taliban's emirate, al-Qaeda, remnants of the Islamic State (IS), and Pakistani terrorist groups are all likely to find sanctuary. According to a recent United Nations Security Council report, "the Taliban and al-Qaeda remain closely aligned" and cooperate through the Pakistan-based Haqqani Network, a front for Pakistani intelligence.

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Terror and the Taliban
Perspectives
Fawaz A. Gerges
17 August, 2021

The unraveling of the effort to build a democratic, secular Afghanistan will pose a far greater threat to the free world than Syria's meltdown, which triggered a huge flow of refugees to Europe and allowed IS to declare a caliphate and extend it into Iraq. The Taliban's absolute power in Afghanistan will sooner or later threaten US security interests at home and abroad.

By contrast, China's interests will be aided by the Taliban's defeat of the world's most powerful military. The exit of a vanquished America creates greater space for China's coercion and expansionism, including against Taiwan, while underscoring the irreversible decline of US power.

"The images of helicopters transporting Americans from the US embassy compound in Kabul, recalling the frenzied evacuation from Saigon in 1975, will serve as a testament to America's loss of credibility - and the world's loss of Pax Americana"

An opportunistic China is certain to exploit the new opening to make strategic inroads into mineral-rich Afghanistan and deepen its penetration of Pakistan, Iran, and Central Asia. To co-opt the Taliban, with which it has maintained longstanding ties, China has already dangled the prospect of providing the two things the militia needs to govern Afghanistan: diplomatic recognition and much-needed infrastructure and economic assistance.

The reconstitution of a medieval, ultra-conservative, jihad-extolling emirate in Afghanistan will be a monument to US perfidy. And the images of Chinook and Black Hawk helicopters transporting Americans from the US embassy compound in Kabul, recalling the frenzied evacuation from Saigon in 1975, will serve as a testament to America's loss of credibility - and the world's loss of Pax Americana.

Brahma Chellaney, Professor of Strategic Studies at the New Delhi-based Center for Policy Research and Fellow at the Robert Bosch Academy in Berlin, is the author of nine books, including Asian Juggernaut, Water: Asia's New Battleground, and Water, Peace, and War: Confronting the Global Water Crisis.

Follow him on Twitter: @Chellaney
© Project Syndicate 1995–2021
Opinions expressed in this article remain those of the author and do not necessarily represent those of The New Arab, its editorial board or staff.

Congo initiates probe into China Moly’s Tenke Fungurume mine
Bloomberg News | August 20, 2021 

Tenke Fungurume operation. (Image courtesy of Freeport-McMoRan Copper & Gold).

The Democratic Republic of Congo established a commission to ensure China Molybdenum Co. is complying with its contractual obligations regarding the giant Tenke Fungurume copper and cobalt project.


The office of President Felix Tshisekedi authorized the investigation earlier this month into CMOC’s mineral reserve data and the financing costs for the project, according to documents seen by Bloomberg News and verified by the presidency. CMOC on Aug. 6 announced a $2.5 billion investment to more than double production at the mine, which is already one of the world’s biggest sources of cobalt, a key mineral in electric-vehicle batteries.

“The goal isn’t anything new, or to attack foreign investors,” Andre Wameso, Tshisekedi’s deputy chief of staff for economic and financial matters and a member of the commission, said by phone Thursday. “If we find nothing, the contract will stay as it was established with its initial inequalities. But if it’s changed disfavoring the DRC, we’re ready to go in another direction.”

A CMOC media representative said the company has no comment.

Tenke produced more than 180,000 tonnes of copper and over 15,000 tonnes of cobalt last year. CMOC wants to add 200,000 tonnes of copper capacity and 17,000 tonnes for cobalt by 2023. World cobalt production totaled about 140,000 tonnes in 2020, according to the US Geological Survey.

“The mine has a lot more reserves than what was in the original contract, so it’s quite logical that we should review what equitably belongs to each according to the contributions of each,” Wameso said. “If the conditions have changed in terms of something that wasn’t there at the initial time, we must review the agreement on the basis of reality.”
Renegotiated deal

Congo last renegotiated the Tenke deal with former owners Freeport-McMoRan Inc. and Lundin Mining Corp. in 2010, when the government increased the shareholding of state-miner Gecamines to 20% from 17.5%. The amended contract also required the Tenke joint venture to pay Gecamines a $1.2 million royalty for each additional 100,000 tonnes of copper reserves discovered beyond 2.5 million tonnes.

Those terms could be up for negotiation if the commission finds the current arrangement is out of balance, Wameso said. The project’s financing terms, which were increased in 2010 to Libor plus 600 basis points from Libor plus 200 basis points, will also be reviewed by the commission, according to the documents.

The Tenke venture is required to find more advantageous financing terms if it can, according to the 2010 amended contract. The current interest rate “eats at profits” and reduces the taxes and dividends paid to Congo, Wameso said.

(By Michael J. Kavanagh, with assistance from Winnie Zhu and Annie Lee)

Russell: BHP’s petroleum exit shows oil and gas may follow coal’s path to toxic status

Reuters | August 18, 2021 

Mt Arthur coal operation in Australia. Image courtesy of BHP Group

(The opinions expressed here are those of the author, Clyde Russell, a columnist for Reuters.)


The market hasn’t exactly cheered BHP Group’s proposed exit from its oil and gas business, with shares of both the mining giant and the acquirer, Woodside Petroleum, tumbling in the wake of deal.

A point of concern for investors is that BHP may have sold the assets too cheaply, and that getting only Woodside shares as payment is less than desirable.

While there is likely some element of truth in this, investors may be missing the wider point of the deal, which will create a $29 billion oil and gas company after all.

It’s likely that this deal signals that the era of paying premiums to acquire oil and gas assets is over. From now on, companies seeking to offload these type of assets will be forced to accept ever-diminishing prices.

BHP’s Sydney-listed shares dropped 8.4% in the two days after the deal was announced on Aug. 17 to close at A$47.70 ($34.44) on Wednesday. Woodside slid 4.2% in the same time period to end at A$20.29.

The pullback continued in early trade on Thursday, with BHP again down, as much as 6.2%, and Woodside dropping as much as 2.6%.

To be sure, there were other reasons for BHP’s stock to retreat. For one, there’s the ongoing slump in the spot price of iron ore, the commodity that generates the most revenue for the world’s biggest mining company.

It’s also possible that some investors may have sought to take profits after BHP on Tuesday reported its strongest earnings since 2012.

But if some BHP stockholders are feeling hard done by, perhaps they should reflect on another asset the Melbourne-based miner is trying to sell.

BHP has had its Mount Arthur thermal coal mine in Australia’s New South Wales state up for sale for more than a year. It still hasn’t found a suitable buyer.

At this stage it’s like that BHP might even pay somebody to take the mine, the biggest in New South Wales, off its hands, given the company slashed the value of the asset on Wednesday from a value of about A$550 million to a liability of A$275 million ($198 million), the Sydney Morning Herald reported.

Just seven months ago the Mount Arthur mine was valued at more than A$2 billion by BHP. The massive writedown in value has come despite the price of Australian thermal coal rising to the highest in 13 years.

The Newcastle Weekly Index, the benchmark thermal coal price, has more than tripled since its 2020 low of $46.37 a tonne, reaching $168.71 in the week to Aug. 13, according to assessments by commodity price reporting agency Argus.

While there are costs associated with rehabilitation that any buyer would have to bear, the fact that BHP can’t seem to find a buyer for Mount Arthur in the best market for thermal coal since 2008 is telling.

Coal assets have largely become toxic, with South32 , the company spun out of BHP, ending up paying about $250 million to offload its thermal coal mines in South Africa.
Oil to follow coal?

While it’s not a fait accompli that oil and gas assets will travel down the same path as coal, the risks are increasing that they will.

A renewed focus on mitigating climate change and rising concern about the environment among investors will make it difficult for oil and gas companies to attract shareholders and capital, even if the prices and demand for crude oil, natural gas and liquefied natural gas (LNG) remain strong.

BHP may have exited oil and gas at just the right time. Its investment in the Jansen potash project in Canada shows that the company is more focused on commodities that will be needed in the future.

However, BHP may still battle to win over climate-sensitive investors given its status as the world’s biggest exporter of coking coal, the polluting fuel used to make steel.

While steel is essential to many products vital to transitioning the world from fossil fuels to clean energy, the process of making it is carbon-intensive – and likely to remain that way for some time to come.

Whether BHP will be able to mount an argument that coking coal is good for the energy transition, or at least a necessary evil, remains to be seen. However, it will likely have to commit to offsetting the emissions from the burning of its coal at some future point.

($1 = 1.3862 Australian dollars)

(Editing by Kenneth Maxwell)

ECOCIDE HAS A COST

Brazil prosecutors compel Vale, BHP to pay $9.5bn in Samarco’s debt

Reuters | August 18, 2021 | 

Paracatu de Baixo resettlement. Credit: BHP

Brazilian prosecutors asked a bankruptcy court on Wednesday to compel miners Vale SA and BHP Group Ltd to fully pay off their Samarco joint venture’s 50.7 billion reais ($9.47 billion) debt, according to a court document reviewed by Reuters.


Samarco filed for bankruptcy protection in April as it struggled to restructure its debt, which it stopped servicing after a dam burst at a mine in 2015, killing 19 people, releasing a giant torrent of sludge and halting production.

Prosecutors consider Samarco’s co-owners to be responsible for the disaster and are seeking a restraining order that would oblige them to cover its debt, according to the document.

The prosecutors said both controlling shareholders used Samarco to obtain immediate gains amid an iron-ore price boom, which they say precipitated the dam’s collapse.

“They chose to put at risk the lives of people who lived and worked there, as well as the environment, causing tragic consequences and incalculable damages,” they wrote.

Vale said in a securities filing it was surprised by the prosecutors’ request.

“The request attacks the clear letter of the agreements signed between the parties, to which the MPMG (prosecutors from Minas Gerais state) is a signatory, in addition to threatening the ongoing discussions and efforts to renegotiate the reparation measures for damage resulting from the Fundão dam collapse,” the company said.

BHP said in a statement the bankruptcy protection request was the best solution it found to allow Samarco to recover financially.

($1 = 5.3543 reais)

(By Carolina Mandl and Marta Nogueira; Editing by Christian Plumb and Peter Cooney)

Chile court orders BHP’s Cerro Colorado mine to stop pumping from aquifer

Reuters | August 19, 2021 | 

Cerro Colorado mine in Chile. (Image by Zwansaurio | Flickr Commons)

A Chilean court ordered BHP’s Cerro Colorado copper mine on Thursday to stop pumping water from an aquifer over environmental concerns, according to filings seen by Reuters.


The same First Environmental Court in July ruled that the relatively small copper mine in Chile’s northern desert must start again from scratch on an environmental plan for a maintenance project.


The court on Thursday called for “precautionary measures” that include ceasing groundwater extraction for 90 days from an aquifer near the mine.

The court said the measures were necessary to prevent adverse effects from pumping from becoming more acute.

Copper miners across Chile, the world’s top producer of the red metal, have been forced in recent years to find alternative means to feed water to their operations as drought and receding aquifers have hampered prior plans. Many have sharply reduced use of continental freshwater or turned to desalination plants.

BHP said in a statement that once the company is officially notified it “will evaluate what course of action to take, based on instruments that the legal framework provides.”

A ruling in January by Chile’s Supreme Court upheld local indigenous communities’ complaint that the environmental review process had failed to consider concerns about the project’s impacts on natural resources, including the regional aquifer.

Cerro Colorado, a small mine in BHP’s Chilean portfolio, produced about 1.2% of Chile’s total copper output in 2020.

(By Fabian Cambero, Erik Lopez and Dave Sherwood; Editing by Grant McCool)

ECOCIDE GENOCIDE MINAMATA DISEASE

Brazil’s Munduruku tribe haunted by mercury’s deadly threat

WATER IS LIFE
Reuters | August 20, 2021 | 

Aerial view of Tapajos River (Credit: Shutterstock)

By the time 38-year-old Irene Munduruku was rushed to a hospital in northern Brazil last year, she could not move her arms and legs. Her husband Jairo Munduruku recalls she was unable to speak or open her eyes.


Doctors told Jairo his wife had tumors in her liver and right lung, but he doubted that cancer was the only cause for her illness.

Recent testing showed Irene’s blood with one of the highest levels of mercury in their village of Sawré Aboy, by the banks of the Tapajós river in the Amazon rainforest. He suspected illegal gold mining had something to do with her illness.

Related Article: Illegal gold represents 17% of Brazil’s exports — study

Wildcat gold mining has expanded fast in Brazil, where the relaxing of environmental controls under far-right President Jair Bolsonaro has emboldened thousands of miners to invade constitutionally protected indigenous lands since 2019.

Brazil’s National Mining Agency estimated that year that wildcat gold miners were extracting some 30 tonnes of gold annually from the Tapajós watershed alone, using the toxic heavy metal mercury to separate gold from sediment.

Driven by sprawling mining camps, deforestation in the indigenous reservation that is home to most of the Munduruku has tripled since Bolsonaro took office, according to government satellite data.

“Since 2019, there has been an immense increase in activity in the region with the opening of new gold mines,” said Carol Marçal, a spokesperson for Greenpeace Brazil’s Amazon Campaign. “Preventative efforts exist, but little has been done to get illegal gold miners out of the area.”

IN THE MOST SEVERE CASES, IT CAN CAUSE NEUROLOGICAL DAMAGE IN UNBORN CHILDREN AND LEAD TO PREMATURE DEATH

Bolsonaro has called for more mining and commercial farming on indigenous land, pushing a bill to lift legal restrictions and – critics say – emboldening miners breaking existing law.

The presidential press office did not reply to a request for comment. Federal indigenous agency FUNAI said it was working to protect tribal reservations including the Munduruku’s and referred questions about their illnesses to indigenous health agency SESAI, which did not answer a request for comment.

Munduruku community leaders told Reuters they fear the advance of illegal mining will poison their rivers, robbing them of their traditions and saddling them with chronic illness.

Irene Munduruku returned home in June, but her condition has deteriorated and she is scheduled to return to hospital this month. Jairo tells his wife’s story as a warning of the crisis his community faces.

“Our ancestors never said we had to become rich from destroying the patrimony that we share,” he wrote to Reuters. “The greatest wealth is knowledge, to know how to respect life.”

Shifting diets

Although mercury poisoning has no cure, community leaders and non-profit groups have looked for ways to reduce risks.

This year, Brazilian NGO Saúde e Alegria has collaborated with nine Munduruku villages to develop alternative water systems reducing reliance on the polluted Tapajós. The local Pariri Association aims to cultivate fish in cleaner streams.

Although project leaders are still looking for funding, they plan on raising species suited for fish farming such as pacu and tambaqui, said Anderson Munduruku, of the Pariri Association.

They are urging neighbors to cut catfish, dogfish and piranha from their diets, since their positions higher up the food chain make them far more contaminated with mercury.

Sometimes members of the tribe can see for themselves what miners have done to the rivers, turning them a muddy brown that community leader Deuziano Munduruku compared to chocolate milk.

But often the mercury poisoning is invisible, contaminating the fish that is their main source of protein.

In a 2019 study of three Munduruku villages, researchers from the Oswaldo Cruz Foundation (Fiocruz) found mercury in the hair samples of all 200 participants.

Most samples showed levels above the safe range – up to nine times the threshold set by the Food and Agriculture Organization of the United Nations.

“It’s incredibly worrying that we are consuming this metal,” said Beka Munduruku, an 18-year-old from Sawré Maybu.

Symptoms of mercury poisoning are far-ranging. Some report weakness, dulled senses and difficulty moving. Others suffer from mood and memory disorders, according to the Fiocruz report.

In the most severe cases, it can cause neurological damage in unborn children and lead to premature death.

Since the Fiocruz study was made public, Munduruku leaders say their people have been plunged into speculation.

Teenagers complain of joint pains. A child is born with crippling disabilities. A local leader dies unexpectedly. Neighbors are left wondering if mercury is to blame.

Mercury poisoning is hard to diagnose because few local clinics test for the metal, according to schoolteacher Honesio Dace Munduruku.

Honesio, who tracks indigenous schools in the Middle Tapajós region, has seen behavioral and physical problems on the rise among students since 2018.

Paulo Basta, one of the principal Fiocruz researchers, said those who performed worse on aptitude tests administered in 2019 had the highest levels of mercury in their hair.

Correlations between mercury levels and tests of memory, verbal fluency and rational thinking were most notable in subjects between the ages of 12 and 20 years, he said, casting a pall over the future of the Munduruku.

(By Jimin Kang; Editing by Brad Haynes and Marguerita Choy)

ECOCIDE  WATER IS LIFE

Angola mine leak causes ‘unprecedented’ pollution in Congo rivers, researchers say

Reuters | August 20, 2021 | 

Congo river viewed from Kintambo. Credit: Wikimedia Commons

A suspected leak of heavy metals from a mine in northern Angola is causing an “unprecedented environmental catastrophe”, affecting some 2 million people in Democratic Republic of Congo, researchers at Kinshasa University said on Friday.


Analysis of satellite imagery and interviews indicate a reservoir used to store mining pollutants was breached on July 15 in a diamond-mining area straddling Lunda Sul and Lunda Norte provinces in Angola, said Raphael Tshimanga, director of The Congo Basin Water Resources Research Centre (CRREBaC).


Two tributaries of the Congo river, the Tshikapa and Kasai rivers, turned red, killing fish and causing diarrhoea amongst communities along their banks, Tshimanga said. There are reports hippopotamuses have also died, he said.

“We have never seen such huge pollution in the Congo river,” Tshimanga said by phone. “It is still increasing, the consequences are beyond what we could imagine. This is a catastrophe. It’s an unprecedented environmental catastrophe.”

The Congolese and Angolan governments have agreed to set up a joint team to investigate the source of the pollution, Congo’s ministry of foreign affairs said.

The discolouration of the waterways appears to have been caused by a toxic substance spill at an industrial diamond mine in Angola, Congo’s environment minister Eve Bazaiba said in a statement on Aug. 9.

Reuters could not independently verify the claim. An Angolan mines ministry official did not respond to a request for comment.

The spill has killed a “significant number of fish and other animal species living in the contaminated waters,” Bazaiba said, adding that pollution was at the “door of Kinshasa”, Congo’s capital and home to some 12 million people.

“We can confidently say that this pollution is from heavy metals that have surged into the river and our worry is that it should get into the food chain,” CRREBaC’s Tshimanga said.

“It could pollute natural reservoirs and aquifers. If this is the case it could take years, decades to resolve this issue.”

(By Hereward Holland, Helen Reid and Stanis Bujakera; Editing by Grant McCool)

Greenhouse gas emissions at gold mines unaffected by lockdowns — report

MINING.com Editor | August 20, 2021 

Stock image.

A new Metal and Mining research report on greenhouse gas emissions in gold mines by S&P Global Market Intelligence reviewed 2020 sustainability reports from more than 90 leading gold mines globally to conduct a year-over-year comparison of greenhouse gas emissions to see the impact of lockdown on emissions.


The report looks at the year-over year comparison of emissions. Mining grades declined in 2020, but despite some fluctuations in actual emissions, that drop in grade led to a drop in gold output, which caused a drop in per-ounce emissions intensity, says S&P.

In 2020, gold output was down 5% globally compared with 2019, largely due to lockdowns imposed to curb the covid-19 pandemic. The combined output from primary gold mines that accounted for around 35% of global supply in 2020 fell just over 1% from 2019 production, the report reads.

Throughput from these mines also fell around 1%, from 847 million tonnes of ore processed in 2019 to 840 Mt in 2020, S&P reports. Meanwhile, emissions from these operations increased less than 1%, from 27.7 million tonnes of CO2 equivalent, or tCO2e, in 2019 to 27.6 MtCO2e in 2020.

Emissions intensity averaged 0.697 tCO2e per ounce of gold produced, the report reads, a negligible decrease year over year. On a per tonne of throughput basis, emissions intensity increased incrementally, up less than 1% to 28.7 tCO2e per thousand tonnes of ore processed.


Negligible change in emissions, divided by less gold gives a bigger value in tCO2e/oz. Supporting that somewhat more-stable nature of open pits, grade didn’t change by much at open pit mines. Underground mines’ per-ounce intensity increased by 13% but declined at open pits, the report finds. Generally, per-tonne emissions intensity remained stable overall.

Lockdowns did occur in a number of regions in 2020 but overall they didn’t cause much change in terms of emissions intensity of a project.

“A period of lockdown might have caused a drop in output, but the emissions are coming from operating the mines. During the lockdown, the equipment and the mills were shut down, therefore the emissions would decline anyway. A drop in emissions divided by a lower output (or throughput for that matter) can just as easily yield the same emissions intensity,” says S&P.

Analysis of 2019 data from 96 gold mines highlighted clear differences in the emissions intensity across mine types, the report finds, with open pit mines exhibiting a higher intensity on a per ounce of gold produced but a lower intensity on a per tonne of ore processed basis.

Resource nationalism sweeps Latin America’s top mining countries

Cecilia Jamasmie | August 19, 2021 | 

Newmont walked away from the $5bn Conga copper-gold project in Peru in 2016, due to relentless community opposition. (Image: Screenshot via YouTube.)

A move towards resource expropriation, tax and royalty increases, as well as demands for local participation in companies’ ownership, all resource nationalism components, continue to increase, with Latin America taking centre stage, a new study shows.


According to the latest report from risk consultancy Verisk Maplecroft, there is a clear four-year trend in minerals-rich nations to seek greater control over the revenues generated by their natural resources, which is expected to increase over the next two years.

The consultancy identified 66 countries out of the 198 included in the resource nationalism index (RNI), or 33% of them, that have tightened the grip on their riches since 2017.

LATIN AMERICA IS THE JURISDICTION WHERE RISKS OF EXPROPRIATION AND TAXES HIKES HAVE INCREASED THE MOST IN THE PAST FOUR YEARS

Latin America is the jurisdiction where risks of expropriation and taxes hikes have increased the most, the study says. Mexico stands out as seeing the nation where the risks have climbed the most, driven by López Obrador administration’s nationalist agenda that wields community and environmental arguments as justification for greater state involvement in the extractive sector, Verisk Maplecroft says.

Mexico’s situation is indicative of a wider regional trend affecting miners and energy firms in the region. South America’s three largest economies, Brazil, Argentina and Colombia are also experiencing substantial negative shifts in the index, while the once stable mining destinations of Chile and Peru are in the midst of political changes that threaten to alter the operating environment for the industry.

Courtesy of Verisk Maplecroft. (Click to enlarge)

Copper prices have soared to record highs this year, handing unions in the two largest producers of the metal — Chile and Peru — additional leverage. The price rally has also ratcheted up tensions in labour negotiations and put pressure on global supply of the red metal.

Verisk Maplecroft’s RNI tracks incidents of direct expropriation and nationalization. The highest scores go to cases where there hasn’t been adequate compensation, no compensation, or in which a government hasn’t paid an award to a company following arbitration.

The ten highest risk countries in the latest edition of the index are Venezuela, Tanzania, Mexico, PNG, Zambia, Russia, North Korea, Kazakhstan, DRC and Zimbabwe.

The motive behind direct expropriation could be short-term political gain or a genuine attempt to save a vital but ailing industry to support the national interest. “The adequacy of compensation is the key factor from a business perspective,” the consultancy says.
Politics and community pressure

In Latin America, the push to gain greater benefit from natural resources generally hinges on two factors. In Mexico and Argentina, the main driving force is ideology, while in Colombia and Chile pressure comes from communities — both those hosting mining projects and civil society.

“While the traditional bastions of stability for Latin America’s mining investors are not yet crumbling, they appear to be joining their regional peers on the path of greater resource nationalism,” the report reads. “Only time will tell how far each one goes down this road.”

In Africa, motivations are much more diverse. The interventionism seen in Liberia and Mauritania is driven by structural governance shortcomings, not nationalist sentiment, Verisk Maplecroft points out.

The line between resource nationalism and legitimate national interest isn’t always easy to draw, and this can exacerbate tensions.

What is key for miners, according to the report, is to detect the signals early on, so that companies can adapt their investment strategies and exploration portfolios to mitigate future exposure to nationalism trends.

By doing so, the consultancy concludes, companies can also prioritize investment in jurisdictions where they can be part of the solution. They can work with local stakeholders to find a balance between community needs and industry profitability to secure long-term social license to operate.

Mexico leads LatAm push for more control of resource revenue

Reuters | August 18, 2021 

Mexican President Andrés Manuel López Obrador. (Image by ProtoplasmaKid, Wikimedia Commons)

Latin American governments have increasingly sought more control of their mining and energy revenue over the past few years, with Mexico leading the pack according to the latest Resource Nationalism Index rankings published by Verisk Maplecroft on Wednesday.


The report said environmental concerns as well as those from local communities increasingly play a bigger role in influencing policy shifts.

Over the past four years, Mexico has risen the most in the ranking, which is currently led by Venezuela. Argentina was placed in the top 20 for the first time after coming in at No. 81 out of 198 countries in the third quarter of 2018.

The rankings represent the level of risk to business from governments taking greater control of economic activity and revenue generated in extractive industries, Verisk Maplecroft said.

The measurements take in to account state drivers, participation in extraction and expropriation outcomes. The higher a country’s ranking, the greater the perceived risk.


THE RISK INCREASE COMES AS COMMODITY PRICES MEASURED BY THE REFINITIV/CORECOMMODITY CRB INDEX THIS QUARTER HIT THE HIGHEST LEVEL SINCE 2015

Mexico’s rise from 101 in 2018’s third quarter to No. 3 at present is driven by President Andres Manuel Lopez Obrador’s “nationalist agenda,” according to the analysis.

“A legislative proposal (now stalled) to nationalize lithium indicates AMLO’s interventionism is all but certain to expand beyond oil and gas in the second half of his term,” the report noted, using an abbreviation for Lopez Obrador.

Mexico’s president has argued that his push to bolster state companies aims to balance a market that has been skewed in favor of the private sector.

In the case of Argentina, Verisk Maplecroft said President Alberto Fernandez’s intervention in multiple sectors is the source of the increased risk.

“Because intervention has largely ideological and political motivations, we expect it to intensify as the government heads into the second half of its term, regardless of the outcome of the November midterms.”

The report notes, however, that Brazil and Colombia, which are led by center-right governments as opposed to the left-leaning Mexico and Argentina, are also seeing an increase in risk for investors in resource sectors.

“The once stable mining destinations of Peru and Chile are on the cusp of political changes that will alter the operating environment for the industry,” said the report.

Peru’s president, Pedro Castillo, sworn in late last month, campaigned partly on the promise of keeping for the country a larger chunk of the revenue derived from mining. Legislation along the same lines is being discussed in Chile, the world’s largest copper producer.

Ecuador, bucking the regional trend, dropped from No. 3 in 2017 to a current rank of 74.

A third of the countries assessed show increasing risks for business over the past four years as governments aim to take more control of revenue associated with extracting industries. About a fourth showed a decrease in such risks.

The risk increase comes as commodity prices measured by the Refinitiv/CoreCommodity CRB index this quarter hit the highest level since 2015. The index last year hit its lowest level in records dating back to 1994.

The MSCI Global Metals and Mining Producers ETF in May hit its highest price since early 2012, while the MSCI Global Energy Producers ETF has nearly doubled in price from depths hit in March 2020.

(By Rodrigo Campos; Editing by Matthew Lewis)