Guatemalan plaintiffs in HudBay lawsuit allege interference Add to ...

Guatemalan plaintiffs in HudBay lawsuit allege interference Add to ...

JORDAN FLETCHER
The Globe and Mail

Published Thursday, Oct. 24 2013, 4:02 PM EDT
Last updated Thursday, Oct. 24 2013, 4:33 PM EDT

A former HudBay Minerals Inc. subsidiary in Guatemala is pressuring a group of indigenous women to drop their high-profile lawsuit against the Canadian miner, lawyers for the women says.

The lawsuit is one of three accusing HudBay and its former subsidiary Compania Guatemalteca de Niquel (CGN) of responsibility for a killing, shootings and gang rapes in Guatemala in 2007 and 2009. The plaintiffs’ complaints about pressure from CGN come two months after the Ontario Superior Court ruled that the women’s case may proceed to trial.

The Ontario court’s ruling on July 22 makes these the first lawsuits alleging a Canadian mining company’s complicity in foreign human rights abuses to move beyond a preliminary stage. The precedent-setting cases have been followed closely in Canada, where mining accounts for a substantial chunk of the economy, as they may widen the scope of potential liability associated with mining operations.

Statements in a letter from lawyers for 11 Mayan Q’eqchi’ women to a representative of Guatemala’s national human rights ombudsman suggest that local mine operator CGN is fighting back. The letter says CGN has threatened in meetings, convened in their own offices, to file criminal defamation charges against the women in Guatemala and to withhold land from others in the community unless the women drop their rape claims in Canada. Both CGN and members of the women’s community assert ownership over land adjacent to CGN’s Fenix nickel mining project in El Estor, Guatemala.

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