The Canadian Almaden Minerals still wants to extract gold and silver in the municipality of Ixtacamaxtitlán, in the state of Puebla. The Supreme Court of Justice struck down two concessions held by the company in February because the government had failed to consult with communities in the area beforehand. It was a historic decision for the rights of indigenous peoples. However, the highest court left the door open to reissue the permits after conducting a consultation. Almaden, through its subsidiary Minera Gorrión, declared itself on Tuesday “in the best possible conditions” for it to stand and thus be able to continue the project.

The future of the controversial open-pit mine that Almaden wants to open hangs in the balance. The historic Supreme Court ruling reaffirmed the right of Indigenous peoples to free, prior and informed consultation about projects located on their territory, a principle established in ILO Convention 169 and which has been repeatedly ignored by governments. Since this requirement was not met before the permits were granted, the court agreed with the Tecoltemi communitywhose territory was granted in concession without being consulted, and left the concessions of the two mining companies “non-existent”, which totaled more than 14,000 hectares.

Now Almaden, which has invested some $40 million in prospecting and exploration work, is waiting for the Ministry of Economy to consult so that it can later recover the concessions, as the court established in the jugement. “The company understands that the application process is still in full force and with that it retains its grandfathering,” it said in a statement. “Minera Gorrión is in the best possible mood and will seek to interact with local authorities and communities so that consultation can take place.”

As the company acknowledges, the Supreme Court did not establish a duration for the realization of the indigenous consultation, which left a wide margin of maneuver to the Government. President Andrés Manuel López Obrador affirmed at the beginning of the sexennium that no new mining concessions would be granted. More recently, before the highest court ruled on the case, The Ministry of the Environment has called on ministers to speak out in favor of the Tecoltemi community.

Almaden tried to distance himself from Tecoltemi, a small ejido worried about the mine’s impact on his water supply. The mining project is located a few kilometers from the applicant population, although the two concessions cross part of its territory. The company said on Tuesday that “it has no interest in holding concession titles that could cover the lands of the community that started this whole legal case”. Almaden has already tried during the trial to waive the part that passed through Tecoltemi in order to annul the legal process. The minor’s request was rejected by the judge at the time.

Indigenous consultation is not the only stumbling block of the enterprise. At the end of 2020, the Ministry of the Environment rejected the Environmental Impact Statement (MIA), which Almaden commissioned a specialist consultant. Authorization is a prerequisite for moving to the exploitation phase. However, the federal agency considered that the document presented underestimated the indigenous presence in the affected area, as well as the impact of the project on the ecosystem.

A year and a half after that rejection, Almaden said the new MIA he is working on is “essentially complete” and that he hopes to enter it once the government holds the indigenous consultation. “Minera Gorrión reaffirms its commitment to the rule of law and to a mining project that will bring development and well-being to Ixtacamaxtitlán and Mexico,” he said.

Meanwhile, Tecoltemi and the social organizations that accompanied the lawsuit against Almaden continue to be vigilant to protect what they see as a historic victory for indigenous peoples against major mining projects. “These criteria are of great relevance because by constituting jurisprudence, and therefore, being mandatory, they strengthen the rights of indigenous peoples and communities in the country and contribute to ending the imposition of mining extractivism in the territories,” they said. .. in June in a press release.

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