Open-pit, cyanide leaching gold mine

[link removed] Share ([link removed])

[link removed]: https%3A%2F%2Fmailchi.mp%2Frightsaction%2Fbluestones-questionable-permit-to-mine-in-guatemala Tweet ([link removed]: https%3A%2F%2Fmailchi.mp%2Frightsaction%2Fbluestones-questionable-permit-to-mine-in-guatemala)

[link removed] Forward ([link removed])

January 25, 2024


** Bluestone Resources’ questionable “permit” to operate open-pit, cyanide leaching gold mine in Guatemala
[link removed]
------------------------------------------------------------

Bluestone Resources (of Canada) announced they received a permit ([link removed]) on January 9, 2024, from the Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources and out-going government of President Alejandro Giammattei, to operate a widely opposed, environmentally devastating, open-pit, cyanide leaching gold mine in the municipality of Asuncion Mita, Guatemala, along the El Salvador border.

One can imagine that folks at Bluestone Resources and their contacts in the out-going government and Ministry of Environment and Natural Resources rushed to get this “permit” approved days before the constitutional transfer of power to the new government, and ouster of the corrupt, reviled government of Giammattei.

Groups like Madre Selva ([link removed]) and the Observatory of Extractive Industries ([link removed]) have denounced for years how this mining operation will deplete and contaminate water sources used by Guatemalans and many more people in El Salvador that depend on the same watershed that this Cerro Blanco open-pit mining operation will inevitably harm.

On January 14, 2024, just after Bluestone acquired this questionable permit, President Bernardo Arevalo and VP Karin Herrera of the Semilla Party assumed office, after six months of country-wide protests, led by Guatemala’s majority Indigenous population, to resist and thwart illegal efforts ([link removed]) to block the election results by the traditional ‘covenant of the corrupt’ elites, and prosecutors and judges loyal to Giammattei.

On January 17, 2024, as if to re-confirm years of denunciations about the systemic corruption of Guatemala’s elected politicians, government officials and judicial operators (judges, prosecutors, etc.), and economic elites and their global business partners, the U.S. State Department issued sanctions against the ousted President Giammattei ([link removed]) and Alberto Pimentel Mata (Ministry of Energy and Mines) for receiving bribes from Swiss companies (Solway Investment Group and Telf Ag) so as to advance their mining interests in eastern Guatemala.

History of mining and systemic corruption, repression, etc.

None of this corruption (let alone repression, environmental and health harms, human rights violations and forced evictions) linked to the global mining industry should be considered surprising, as Catherine Nolin (my co-editor) and I document in the 2021 book TESTIMONIO: Canadian Mining in the Aftermath of Genocides in Guatemala ([link removed]) .

In the book, Sandra Cuffe summarizes the context in which mining companies and their supportive governments back home (Canada, Switzerland, U.S., etc.) claim that they are doing business in a transparent, legal and democratic manner:

“A military coup clears the way for mining interests. Exploitation licenses are granted by military rulers. A mining company is directly involved in attacks and assassinations. A mining law is written by future mining company personnel. Exploitation licenses are granted by corrupt government officials. A transnational mining executive becomes a fugitive. Company and government officials coordinate police and military action to quell dissent. People’s homes are burned to the ground. People are killed.”

“The history of mining in Guatemala over the past sixty years is one of violence, corruption, and impunity. It is a history of transnational mining companies doing whatever they need to in order to advance their interests, working with every government administration along the way, whether with genocidal military rulers or with administrations so corrupt that most top officials are now sitting in prison cells.”

No rest for the weary

Another Conflict. MEM (Ministry of Energy and Mines):
“We do not agree with the Neighborhood Consultation in Asuncion Mita.”

In September 2022, the vast majority of people who live in the municipality of Asuncion Mita voted against the mining project of Bluestone, in a legally binding community consultation project. Bluestone’s lawyers in Guatemala are challenging the consultation before Guatemala’s corrupted, disgraced Constitutional Court.

Now, they have no time to enjoy the historic election of President Arevalo and VP Herrera, and Guatemala’s return to having an actually democratic government for the first time in 70 years ([link removed]) . The people of Asuncion Mita need support inside Guatemala and from Canada, home to Bluestone Resources, to continue to resist this widely opposed, and potentially devastating mining operation.

Grahame Russell, Rights Action
[email protected] (mailto:[email protected])

Peter Hemstead | President, CEO, and Chair of the Board
Phone: +1 604 689 7842
[email protected] (mailto:[email protected])
www.bluestoneresources.ca ([link removed])

Canadian Embassy in Guatemala
Ambassador Rajani Alexander
13 Calle 8-44 Zone 10, Edificio Edyma Plaza, Guatemala
[email protected] (mailto:[email protected])
+(502) 2363-4348
[link removed]

Recent information
* Asuncion Mita population vote ‘NO’ to Bluestone Resources, [link removed]
* Legally binding Neighborhood Consultation concerning mining under attack in Guatemala, [link removed]

More information
* Observatorio de Industrias Extractivas, [link removed], [link removed]
* Madre Selva Colectivo Ecologista, [email protected] (mailto:[email protected]) , [link removed]
* Jen Moore, Institute for Policy Studies, [email protected] (mailto:[email protected])
* ACAFREMIN, Alianza Centro Americana frente a la minería, [email protected] (mailto:[email protected]) , [link removed]

TESTIMONIO-Canadian Mining in the Aftermath of Genocides in Guatemala
Edited by Professor Catherine Nolin (UNBC) & Grahame Russell (Rights Action)
[link removed]
[link removed]

Catherine Nolin, [email protected] (mailto:[email protected])
Grahame Russell, [email protected] (mailto:[email protected])

Tax-Deductible Donations (Canada & U.S.)

To support land and environmental defenders, and human rights, justice and democracy defense struggles in Honduras and Guatemala, make check to "Rights Action" and mail to:
* U.S.: Box 50887, Washington DC, 20091-0887
* Canada: Box 82858, RPO Cabbagetown Toronto, ON, M5A 3Y2

Credit-Card Donations: [link removed]
Direct deposits, write to: [email protected] (mailto:[email protected])
Donations of securities, write to: [email protected] (mailto:[email protected])

*******

Please share and re-post this information

*******

More info: [email protected] (mailto:[email protected]) , www.rightsaction.org
e-Newsletter: [link removed]
Previous e-Newsletters: [link removed]
[link removed]
[link removed]
[link removed] ([link removed])
[link removed]
[link removed] Facebook ([link removed])
[link removed] Twitter ([link removed])
[link removed] Website ([link removed])
[link removed] Instagram ([link removed])
[link removed] YouTube ([link removed])

============================================================
Copyright © 2024 Rights Action, All rights reserved.
You are receiving this email because you are one of our subscriptor

Our mailing address is:
Rights Action
Box 50887
20091-0887
Washington, DC 0
USA
** unsubscribe from this list ([link removed])
** update subscription preferences ([link removed])
Email Marketing Powered by Mailchimp
[link removed]