Canadian mining giant Barrick Gold is facing more questions about its handling of a spill at its mining operations in Argentina last month.
Argentinean Environment Minister Sergio Bergman has called on provincial officials to begin court proceedings against the company after a spill of “processing solution” at its Veladero mine September 8.
Barrick told NOW recently that it notified government officials immediately about the spill. The company reported that “a small quantity of solution” was quickly cleaned up. The company says none reached local waterways. But that version of events seems to conflict with the Argentine government’s move last week to suspend operations “indefinitely” at the mine and take Barrick to the federal court in San Juan for “non-compliance” of the country’s hazardous waste protocol.
“We are going to present before the Federal Justice of San Juan a complaint under Law No. 24,051 of Hazardous Waste to the Company Barrick Gold for non–compliance of the protocol”. This complaint was submitted because (Barrick) did not comply with protocol,” said Bergman.
Barrick President Kelvin Dushnisky downplayed the most recent development, the latest in a string of controversies at the mine. He told Reuters at a meeting of gold mining executives at the Denver Gold Forum September 19 that the mine would be back up and running in two weeks or so.
“The restart will be subject to the provincial government inspecting the work. The government has been very responsive in the past,” Dushnisky said.
But local pressure is mounting on federal authorities to intervene on the provincial government’s handling of Barrick operations and shutdown the mine completely. Members of the Asamblea Jáchal No Se Toca, some of them marching 150 kilometres to the government offices in San Juan last week, blame the mine for the rise in a number of ailments in children.
Located some 4,000 metres above sea level outside of San Juan, and 90 kilometers from the Indigenous community of Jachal, Veladero is Barrick’s third-largest gold producer and accounts for some 10 per cent of the company’s annual gold output producing 600,000 ounces of gold a year.
Operations at the mine had already been suspended as a preventative measure earlier last month after what the company described as a minor spill of “processing solution,” confirmed later to include cyanide.
Barrick’s official statement concerning that leak was released the morning of September 12, some four days after the incident. But the company has yet to release details as to the extent of the spill, which occurred almost a year to the day of the largest environmental disaster in Argentina’s history at the site when some one million litres of cyanide solution contaminated local waterways. The company was fined $10 million by an Argentine court over the incident. Nine current and former Barrick employees were also ordered to face criminal charges.
At the time, a special prosecutor also ordered the San Juan mining ministry to turn over to federal investigators all approvals issued to Barrick as well as the details of contingency plans put in place to prevent future spills.
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