Mapping Corporate Mayhem

Xstrata

01 / Australia

Xstrata’s McArthur River mine is at extreme risk of a “tailings” dam bank failing as well as acid draining into one of the river’s tributaries. The open pit zinc mine nearby covers 83 hectares and the tailing pond sprawls over an additional 210 hectares, held by the dam that has polluted Surprise Creek. It sits on the landscape like a vast open sore.  5.5 kilometres of the river have been shifted off its normal course by the company. Aborigines and other local people are deeply upset by what they see as  the destruction to their sacred sites and livelihoods.

There has been failure on the part of Xstrata to listen to the Aboriginal people who live along the McArthur River. One of these groups, the Yanyuwa, were able to legally claim ownership of the land in 1977 under the Aboriginal Land Rights Act.  Nevertheless, Mount Isa Mines which had discovered vast underground deposits of lead, silver and zinc in the area began underground mining along the river in 1995.

The CFME Union in Australia made the following claims of breaches of OECD guidlines by Xstrata while operating in their territories: Part IV, 1(a) 2(a) 2(c), Part IV (6), (8), regarding industrial relations, collective bargaining and labour rights. They also claimed breaches of Part IX regarding anti-competitive practices. Xstrata has been very obstructive to talks with the Union and other organisations over this matter. The mining sites affected by this in Australia are: Newlands Mine, Queensland. Ulan Mine (NSW), United Mine (NSW) and Tahmoor Mine (NSW).

02 / Argentina

Minera Alumbrera: there have been numerous protests aimed at shutting down the mine.

There were further protests against the lifting of a judicial order prohibiting any mining activity in Agua Rica project area.

Last month, the governor of La Rioja Province suspended Osisko Mining Corporation’s gold mine in the Famatina region, after much resistance from activists and local residents.

The battle has now shifted to the neighbouring Catamarca Province. Residents of the town Andalgala put up roadblocks to Xstrata’s Alumbrera copper/gold mine and its nearby Agua Rica project. Police clashed with activists when clearing the roads and now groups of mining supporters have put their own roadblocks in place.

03 / Chile

At the Rio Cuervo Project, a hydroelectric dam, there have been great concerns about the building of a dam on a geological fault. The fault line is geologically active and has already caused landslides and a tsunami.

The project would have resulted in the loss of two lakes and an entire balanced ecosystem of wetlands and grazing land, used for years by local communities

The Supreme Court has just put a halt to the project on environmental grounds although other dams in the area are still being planned.

04 / Columbia

At the Colombian El Cerrejon mine, possibly one of the largest in the world and which supplies some of the coal we use in the UK. Xstrata, BHP Billiton and Anglo American have been in dispute with workers over attempts to cut back on basic workers’ rights such as pay, health, pensions and the rights of sub-contracted workers.

05 / Philippines

Xstrata‘s Tampakan project. The Kalikasan People’s Network for the Environment found that the mine did not have the Free and Informed Consent of the affected B`laan people.

The Philippines is one of 143 countries which adopted The UN Declaration on the Rights of Indigenous Peoples. Many of the tribespeople within the mining area are not fully aware of its potentially negative impact on the environment and their livelihoods and those who embraced it did so in the belief that it would lead to the provision of basic social services which the government has failed to do and which the company has promised.

An environmental assessment of the impacts of this open cast mine by geologists from the University of the Philippines,found it “would not only pollute rivers but will eventually destroy the sources of ground water in the mountains,”  The impact of this will be detrimental to farming and food security for the local people, the majority of whom depend on agricultural activities for their livelihoods.

Nevertheless, the company is trying to push ahead with the mine.

Glencore

06 / Angola

In late 2009, four men were convicted by a French court of supplying weapons to Angola in the midst of its 27-year civil war, in defiance of a UN embargo. Pierre Falcone, Arcadi Gaydamak, Jean-Christophe Mitterrand and Charles Pasqua were all found guilty.

November 1993, ‘Falcone and Gaydamak helped arrange the sale to Angola of $47 million in small arms. A second deal for $563 million worth of weapons, including tanks and helicopters, got under way early the following year … Angolans paid for the weapons with oil, which Falcone and Gaydamak sold through Glencore.’

07 / Peru

September 2007, was a key player in implementing an aggressive anti-union policy at Minera Los Quenuales lead-zinc operation in Peru, a month before a worker had died by being crushed under a heap of ore.

The workforce began an ‘indefinite general strike’ to draw attention to their unmet demands, and another person is killed and dozens reportedly injured, when it barricaded access to the mine.

08 / Columbia

Glencore subsidiary, Prodeco, operates on government owned land in El Prado, northern Colombia. Land forcibly taken from its previous residents by paramilitaries in a six month
“campaign of terror” during which least 18 people were murdered.

February 2007, residents near Prodeco’s La Jagua de Ibirico coal mine in Colombia’s Cesar province set up barricades to protest at environmental damage and respiratory illnesses allegedly inflicted by the mining operations there. In response, police attacked demonstrators, reportedly killing one man.

09 / Congo

March 2011 Glencore is accused of human rights abuses, employing child labour, causing pollution and evading taxes in the DR Congo. Accusations centred around Glencore’s operations in the province of Katanga, where it has a $250 million 77% share in Katanga Mining Limited (KML), a major copper and cobalt producer.

Mining is ‘driving the locals away from their traditional farming activities, which has led to less food on the market. There are often no safety measures in KML sites. Miners are not adequately protected from Uranium radiation.’

Houses reportedly damaged by explosive charges and the air polluted by emissions from the mining operations. Glencore contacted ‘to no avail’.

10 / Zambia

From Glencore’s operation at Mopani copper-cobalt complex in Zambia, Ivan Glasenberg CEO received a bundle of letters children at a school exposed on a daily basis to sulphur dioxide pollution from the nearby Mopani Copper Mines (MCM). Children described how toxic clouds made them choke, burnt their throats and poisoned the school’s fruit trees.

In 2009, the Environmental Council of Zambia reported sulphur dioxide emissions up to 70x the maximum health limit set by the World Health Organisation. A mineral expert’s report in Glencore’s prospectus confirmed sulphur dioxide emissions from MCM were ‘consistently exceeding’ environmental limits: 3 monitoring stations outside the plant repeatedly recorded breaches of air pollution limits.’

There have been various illegal discharges of hazardous fluids into rivers, an acid leak that had contaminated town’s water supply resulting in “hospitalisation and treatment of a number of people”’. The company has done virtually nothing to introduce stringent anti-pollution measures to the area.

MCM is co-owned by Glencore and First Quantum Minerals. In April 2011, 5 International NGOs filed complaints against both companies, alleging they had violated  OECD Guidelines. The claims were based on results of 2009 audit, performed at the request of the Zambian Government.

Among the anomalies were ‘an unexplained increase in the company’s operating costs in 2007 (+$380 million); stunningly low reported volumes of extracted cobalt when compared to similar mining companies operating in the region, and manipulations of copper selling prices.

11 / Australia

Members of the Wutha Native (Aboriginal) Title Claimants Group in Australia were cheated of an agreement made with Glencore in 1996, under which the company guaranteed to employ some of them in return for mining nickel on their land. (The case was only recently settled out of court.)

12 / Bolivia

According to The Times, Glencore was guilty of causing river pollution at its operations in Bolivia.

Xstrata Unions

October 2008.  Unions from Xstrata operations in Australia, Germany, Canada, Chile, Peru and the Dominican Republic met in Canada with the International Federation of Chemical, Energy, Mine and General Workers’ Unions (ICEM). At the conclusion they announced plans to create an International Solidarity Fund and to move toward the creation of a global council of Xstrata unions. They stated their concern that  “… Xstrata’s actions are having a negative impact on workers and communities around the world…” and that they are, contrary to the company’s own claims, failing to act according to the highest labour and environmental standards.’

Glencore Corporate

A Glencore subsidiary procured lucrative market-sensitive information from a European Union “mole’’, which, ‘threatens to undermine the EU’s Common agricultural policy’.