Increasingly Broad Social Movements Fight Mining

Increasingly Broad Social Movements Fight Mining
By Helda Martínez


BOGOTÁ, Feb 7, 2011 (IPS) - Social mobilisation against gold-mining is growing in Colombia, which is now one of the world's biggest per capita polluters of mercury, used in artisanal mining, according to the United Nations Industrial Development Organisation (UNIDO).

"Development, foreign investment, the generation of jobs or promises for improved living conditions for locals cannot be used as arguments to jeopardise the water wealth of our páramos (highland moors)," the national retailers association, FENALCO, said in a statement.

The association informed the government of Juan Manuel Santos of its staunch opposition to the Angostura mining project, an open pit mine that is to produce gold and silver over the next 15 years, run by the Canadian firm GreyStar on the páramo of Santurbán in the northern department (province) of Santander.

"We do not support this activity, which will cause irreparable and irreversible damages," Erwing Rodríguez, director of FENALCO in Bucaramanga, the provincial capital, told IPS by phone. ...........(more)

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