Frik Els , Editor

Reuters reports leaders in Peru's Cajamarca region demanded on Wednesday that Newmont Mining and partner Buenaventura abandon their $4.8 billion Conga project after talks with the central government broke down. The president of Cajamarca said massive protests will be held next week. In October, Newmont was forced to briefly shut down adjacent Yanacocha, South America's largest gold mine over the protests. Conga would be the biggest investment ever in Peru mining and is a crucial test for the country's new president Ollanta Humala, who campaigned on ending conflicts over natural resources.

ZeeNews report the world's largest steel-maker ArcelorMittal on Thursday reported a dip of over 51% in net income to $659 million for the quarter ended September 30, 2011, due to rising raw material costs and a fall in demand. The Indian giant also said it will face increasing pricing and volume pressures in the final quarter and is idling production as a result – it has mothballed eight furnaces in Europe and permanently retired another just over the last two months. Arcelor's gloomy outlook prompted one analyst to observe: "We're in a very dark market environment right now."

Equipment failure that put a huge dent in production and which is now the subject of a $140 million insurance claim, higher input costs as a result of increased electricity charges, and three fatalities and a pricing dispute with a unit of Anglo American were the main reasons given for a headline loss of $58 million for the quarter.

South Africa's National Union of Mineworkers (NUM) called off a strike on Wednesday after reaching a deal with Xstrata over the coal giant's voluntary employee share ownership plan. Xstrata agreed to allocate shares to workers equally and not based on employment grade, NUM's one gripe. Mine ownership and nationalization are once again fiercely debated topics in the country 17 years after the end of white rule and observers believe SA’s allure as an investment destination has been tarnished by the heavy weather accompanying the Xstrata deal. The plan gives workers 3% of the company and is over and above the company’s 26% local ownership obligations which it already meets.

Shares of Randgold Resources, a pure-play gold mining company focused on west and central Africa, soared 7.4% Wednesday after announcing third quarter production increased 80% and sales jumped to $309.6 million from only $116.3 a year ago. Despite a once-off drop in gold sales from the previous quarter following instability at its Tongon mine in the Ivory Coast where it has been producing for one year and what it described as once in a century rainfall at its Loulo/Gounkoto operations in Mali, third-quarter income increased more than four-fold to $106.8 million.

The UK's Telegraph reports two hundred wealthy Democrats were paying $5,000 a head this week to have lunch with Barack Obama – up to $7,500 if they also wanted their pictures taken with him – at San Francisco's posh W Hotel. Outside it was very different – some of the party's biggest donors were protesting. There is increasing bitterness on the left about Obama's perceived closeness to industry and what they see as his failure to honour environmental promises. Like the San Francisco protesters many former campaign donors are now threatening to withdraw financial support if he fails to block the Keystone XL oil pipeline and putting off the decision – hinted at by the US State Department this week – should not come as a surprise to anyone following Obama's poll numbers..

Arabian American Development Co, announced over the weekend it has completed construction of the gold, silver and copper mine in Saudi-Arabia which it is developing with Saudi's Al-Kobra Mining Company (Amak). The Texas-based company, which owns 37% of Amak, said it will turn the facility over to the Chinese surface operator to begin operations end-November. In July Arabian American Development got a $37m injection from a fund controlled by the League of Arab States. Shareholders in the Nasdaq-listed company saw the value of their investment rise a cool $107m as a result of the transaction and over the last month stock in the 44-year old company has risen 28.5%. The mine in a Yemen border province is the only non-government mine in the Saudi kingdom and is scheduled to begin production early next year.

Reuters reports unionised Chilean workers at Collahuasi, the world's third most productive copper mine, halted production on Saturday in a strike demanding a wage bonus, but were back at work on Sunday after after reaching an agreement with management, the company and union said. Collahuasi is owned by Switzerland's Xstrata and the Britain-based Anglo American. Collahuasi produced 504,000 tonnes of copper in 2010, when output was hit by a month-long strike. The mine expects to produce 500,000 tonnes of copper this year. It supplies roughly 3% of the world's copper, half that of Chile's other giant copper mine Escondida.

The regulatory process for Enbridge’s Northern Gateway pipeline to connect Alberta's oil sands and markets in Asia, is shaping up to make the TransCanada's Keystone XL approval look like a cake walk. Starting in January, an unprecedented 4,000-plus people – the vast majority environmental activists – will speak for a collective 650 hours at public hearings on the controversial pipeline that would stretch for 1,170km from Brudenheim in Alberta to a new marine terminal at Kitimat in northern British Columbia, Canada. The project is already almost a year behind schedule and would not go into operation in 2017 at the soonest.

The Guardian reports the approval for Britain's only commercial goldmine despite opposition from environmental groups has sparked fears for the Loch Lomond and the Trossachs National Park national park. The mine is around 1 kilometre inside the park boundary. It was the second time Sydney-listed mining company Scotgold had applied to mine gold and silver at the Cononish site, which it bought in 2007. It was turned down last year over concerns about waste – 400,000 tonnes will be produced over the mine's 10-year life – and rehabilitation. At current prices, Scotgold believes there could be around $275 million of the precious metals at the site and it could start producing ounces early in 2013.