The World Gold Council and the Gold Miners Association of Turkey are bringing together local and international gold mining companies at the “Responsible Gold Mining Conference” on Thursday, May 16, at the Sheraton Hotel in Ankara. In this one-day program, they will discuss the future of the gold market, sustainability of gold mining, biodiversity practices, climate change, water management, etc.
Of course, we do not expect the companies operating gold mines and the organizations that act as their spokespersons to talk about the death that gold mining brings to the workers of this country and the destruction it causes on its lands, nature, streams and forests.
Just 3 months ago, 9 miners in the Çöpler Gold Mine in Erzincan’s İliç district were trapped under a million-ton collapse as a result of the collapse of the incorrectly planned heap leach. While the bodies of 4 workers were found, 5 workers are still underground!
We are all witnesses to what kind of destruction the gold mine project launched by Alamos Gold company on the Kaz Mountains (Mount Ida) region in 2019 created in the ecosystem of the region. Moreover, many similar projects continue to kill workers and destroy the entire ecology all over Anatolia.
Among the participants of the conference, those responsible for the destruction created by mining projects stand out. For example, TÜPRAG, the Turkish representative of the Canadian Eldorado company, whose license including 364-hectare area in Afyon’s Emirdağ district was canceled last November, mentioned about climate change and global warming as “abstract claims” in its defense in court. But the irony is that the same company will discuss how gold mining is done in terms of environmental awareness and sustainability at the Conference on May 16! Additionally, a short research will reveal where else this company has committed environmental crimes in Turkey. Just one example: Kışladağ Gold Mine, which has been operated by TÜPRAG since 2006, destroyed an area equal to one-fourth size of Uşak district and caused underground water resources to dry up. The tragic part is that in May last year, the government gave this company an incentive of 1,637,614,424 TL, through the Ministry of Industry and Technology, for the modernization of Efemçukuru Gold Mine, which it operates in Izmir and has plundered the water resources of the region.
At this conference, TÜPRAG company will also discuss the heap leaching method which caused the death of 9 workers and an environmental disaster that will last for decades in Ilic district of Turkey. However, there is no doubt that the environmental destruction that the company committed with the heap leaching method in the 2000s will be overlooked. It is enough to look at the statement of the Chamber of Metallurgical and Materials Engineers on this subject, available at https://www.metalurji.org.tr/dergi/dergi143/d143_1617.pdf.
Those who wish can make a search on how TÜMAD Mining, another participant of the conference, affiliated with Nurol Holding, has endangered the Bayramdere and Umurbey Dam, which are drinking water sources, through its gold mine in Çanakkale Lapseki; how it has carried out gold exploration with cyanide in Madra Mountain and how it is protected by the existing government of Turkey.
Finally, we should mention about Öksüt Mining, owned by the Canadian company Centerra Gold, which is one of the participants of the conference. 71 workers working in the company’s gold mine in Develi-Kayseri province of Turkey, were exposed to mercury poisoning in February 2022. In the expert’s report on the subject, it was revealed that although it was detected that 8 security guards had high amounts of mercury in their blood, these people were deliberately got to work. But instead of a punishment, the capacity increase requested by the company in the following year was approved by the Ministry of Environment, Urbanization and Climate Change!
Another thing that should not be ignored is the hotel chain hosting the Conference! Sheraton Ankara Hotel and Congress Center is a brand affiliated with Marriott International. In its 2023 Environmental, Social and Governance Progress Report, Marriott International emphasizes on how sensitive its hotels are to the planet’s climate problem within the scope of sustainability strategies and mentions about its short and long-term carbon reduction targets, the targets it has achieved and plan to achieve in the field of renewable energy and effective water use, its projects supporting environment and local people and afforestation initiatives.
However, it is for your consideration to evaluate whether hosting gold companies, which play a leading role in the murder of workers and nature, is compatible with the mentioned environmental goals given above! Sincerity in environmental awareness requires closing the doors to this conference!
We are aware of everything!
The political power, for the sake of short-term interests, shuts its eyes to the local and international mining companies to grow by plundering the richness of these lands and destroying our living spaces; to do “greenwashing” by using the concepts of sustainability, sensitivity to the environment and humanity and to cover up their responsibilities in disasters like Ilic!
The only ones who need to talk about this issue are the victims of the destruction created in these lands and the people whose lives, forests, streams and habitats have been occupied for the sake of these companies’ uncontrollable greed for profit!
As the Energy, Industry and Mining Public Employees Union, we will continue our struggle to call the companies to account for the ecological crimes they have committed and to reveal the public authorities who shut their eyes to them!
