The Mongolian government is rightly trying to translate the presence of international mining companies into economic development — higher salaries, investment in infrastructure, improvements in health and education.
Earlier this month anti-mining activists from 28 countries announced they would work together to seek a binding UN treaty and international tribunal to address the destructive impact of international mining.
TAVAN TOLGOI, Mongolia — "All you need to mine here is a shovel," said an awe-struck Indian investment manager as he stood behind a barrier, along with dozens of international mining industry executives and other eager investors, gazing at the immense coal pit gouged out of the rust-colored earth below.
As angry communities in Colorado last week counted the cost of a toxic spill from an old gold mine, a new atlas of 600 international mining and oil companies has identified more than 1,500 ongoing conflicts raging over water, land, spills, pollution, ill-health, relocations, waste, land grabs, floods and falling water levels.
In Mongolian, with English subtitles 1 hour 26 minutes; not rated For more than a decade, Mongolian nomads have been illegally prospecting for gold in the Gobi Desert, gleaning the leftovers of the international mining companies that own the mineral rights.
Alcan Packaging is a Paris-based unit of Rio Tinto, the giant international mining company that has recently come under pressure to reduce its $39 billion in debt.
Called the "Skunk Riot Control Copter," the manufacturer claims its already shipped 25 of them to an international mining company.
On Tuesday, the Australian share market lost $56 billion [$39 billion USD] on the back of a global shitstorm with international mining giant Glencore at its center.
Over 70 years old, and he was always willing to make the trip -- whatever the trip, wherever it took him -- to talk, to testify, to tell the terrible story of the uniquely reckless scheme by international mining giants to poison the communities and wild salmon fisheries of Alaska's Bristol Bay with a gigantic copper and gold mine.
He recommended that the Embassies as a group (U.S., Canada, U.K., Australia, Switzerland, and South Africa) highlight the billions of dollars invested in Peru by international mining companies.
He presents a lively portrait of the rapacious "looting machine" in which international mining companies contrive with local African elites to strip the continent of its resources.
