YEREVAN, DECEMBER 2, ARMENPRESS: Armenian nature protection ministry has turned down today a reportedly $100 million worth investment project, promised by an Indian company that runs gold mines in Sotk, near the town of Vardenis in Gegharkunik province, for construction of a gold extracting plant.
Despite the company’s expert’s arguments that the proposed plant will be equipped with state-of-the art devices to neutralize wastes and prospects for 3,000 jobs for the region plagued with unemployment, Armenian nature protection minister Vartan Ayvazian has endorsed the arguments of local ecological non-governmental organizations who claim that construction of a gold ore processing plant in Vardenis would prove catastrophic for environment and especially for Armenia’s biggest lake of Sevan, located some 20 miles off.
The exploitation of the Sotk gold mine began in 1976 and continued throughout the remaining years of the Soviet Union by Ararat Gold Recovery Company ltd. (AGRC). In 2002, an Indian company, Sterlite Gold ltd., bought all the shares of AGRC, and started processing the accumulated gold at the Ararat plant and exploiting the Sotk open-shaft gold mines. The Indian company first asked the government’s permission to build the factory in 2004 saying transportation of the ore to current plant located in the town of Ararat, more than 200 km away, was too costly.
Speaking at a second round table discussion of the issue Ayvazian cited the findings of an ecological expertise which found that if the plant were built chemical substances used for gold separation would flow into rivers and the lake to jeopardize the local nature and people. Another argument he cited was that the proposal did not comply with provisions of the Law on Lake Sevan that bans construction of ore processing plants around the lake.
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