Bogotá — Canada’s Cosigo Resources, Ltd., and its local subsidiary Cosigo Resources Sucursal Colombia (Bogotá), and US-based Tobie Mining and Energy, Inc. have lost their bid to continue gold mining operations in Colombia’s Yaigoje Apaporis National Park.
The decision by the Colombian authorities puts an end to a years-long legal dispute after the park was delimited and declared a protected area in 2009, despite the fact that a 30-year mining concession was granted in an area that is part of the park during the same year.
Cosigo has issued no statement regarding the ruling.
The Canadian company disputed the ruling in 2015, an appeal that was denied, and this week’s ruling is the final verdict on the case, based on a 1977 regulation (Decree 622) that prohibits mining activities in the areas that make up the country’s national parks.
However, the Canadian company had argued in its litigation case that the mining concession was granted before the creation of the national parks system, according to Andrés Rendle, who was then president for Latin America of Cosigo Resources.
He argued that the Colombian mining authority failed in its obligations, since it negligently issued incorrect information stating that there was no mining or geological interest in the area of the park, and which allowed for the creation of the Yaigoje Apaporis national park.
In addition to questioning the legality of Resolution 2079 of 2009, he said the mining authority should respect the contract.
Lawsuit against Colombia
In March 2016, Colombia was notified of a $16.5 billion arbitration lawsuit by the three mining companies, alleging that their mining rights were revoked illegally and in violation of the US-Colombia Free Trade Agreement that came into force on May 15, 2012.
Cosigo Resources Colombia and Tobie Mining and Energy, Inc. sought damages amounting to 66 billion pesos ($16.6 million), a claim based on Article 10.16 of the US-Colombia trade agreement, which states that the resolution of disputes must be made through the International Center for Settlement of Investment Disputes.
The Canadian mining company considered the Colombian authority’s action as an expropriation.
In May 2011, Cosigo Resources listed its shares on the Toronto Stock Exchange to raise funds to finance exploration activities. The company’s market capitalization reached $35 million.
Cosigo Resources owns the Machado project in Colombia and its main focus is on the Taraira gold belt, located over 9,973 hectares on the border between northwestern Brazil and southeastern Colombia, where geochemical sampling has identified potentially gold-bearing strata over more than 20 kilometers.
These are the sites known as Cerro Rojo, Peladero and Cerro Bombo, 600km from Villavicencio and accessible only by airplane, and which were discovered between 1985 and 1986.
Colombia’s ‘Avatar’
At the time, the weekly news magazine Semana dubbed the conflict around the Yaigoje Apaporis National natural park as the “Colombian Avatar” because of the role of the struggle of the local Indigenous communities, liking it to directo James Cameron’s blockbuster movie.
A 2001 report in Semana cited the Indigenous leader of Vaupés as saying that, with the foreign-owned mining operation would come “beer, deforestation, easy money, and the death of the culture”.
“All the indigenous people who got involved with gold are now extinct. Gold is the reflection of light on the earth, it is so sacred that it is better to leave it alone,” he warned.
