NORMANDY MINING CANNOT IGNORE THE COURT ORDER IN TURKEY
by Emet Deširmenci

Bergama villagers won the Court case to stop the mining operation on 23 June, but Normandy do not want to listen. They continue with operation. Normandy has announced that "We are using 670 kilo cyanide per day to extract 10 kilo of gold and silver from the ore since 4 May". They are trying to prove how safe their method are by swimming into the tailing dam and by showing their test results (12 July 2001, Milliyet, Daily Turkish Newspaper).

However, Izmir Administrative Court decided to stop their operation, because their method was the same, Cyanide Leaching. The fear of local people will continue even after they cease the process. According to the Court, heavy metals in tailing dams may continue to affect their health in 20-50 years. It is not possible to believe that they have a method, which guaranty hundred percent prevention from any accident, because there are many historic earthquakes in the region.

Nowadays, it is hard to have any media coverage on mainstream media in favor of local people due to policies imposed by IMF and World Bank for Turkish economic crisis. They prefer to make coverage for Normandy, because Normandy pays for advertisement but the poor local people can not. Once again, Normandy is showing its opportunistic face offering economic benefit for mining, because Bergama is barrier for themselves to start their hundreds of project across Turkey. Despite this second court case (previous one was from Turkish High Court in 1997), they are trying to violate court orders and advertising gold mining on the Media to justify their violation.

On the other hand, 210 scientists and many professional chambers declared to support the local people. For instance, Zulfu Asik, Profesor at Middle East Technical University, stated "there is a significant risk because plastic cover has already torn at the cyanide dam". Also the head of the Chamber of Environmental Engineers pointed out that "3.5 tons very dangerous waste will be produced. Millions of dollars have to spend for clean up operation. Local people do not want this operation. Can they do the same thing in Australia?" (20 July 2001, Evrensel, Turkish daily Newspaper). Moreover, local people say "our cottons and tobaccos", near the mine has started to be rotten due to cyanide poisoning". 

Local people are waiting to hear this operation ceased from Turkish Prime Minister. Their  strong opposition continues and say "we do not need any benefit from the mine, we have more than 1000 years old olive trees. We want to keep our fertile soil and historical sites clean for future generation".

© July 28, 2001,  Emet Deširmenci

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