Colombia bans mining in country’s vast moorlands

Colibri Resource Corporation reports final results from a 2400 meter drill program at the Ramard silver project, in Sonora, Mexico. The Ramard property consists of over 4000 hectares of mineral concessions located 100 km north of the city of Hermosillo, Sonora, wholly owned by Colibri's Mexican subsidiary, Minera Halcones. The Ramard property contains numerous historical artisanal silver mine workings.

B2Gold Corp. reports a temporary shutdown of the underground workings at the Limon Mine in Nicaragua due to on-going rescue attempt of a missing worker during heavy rains and mine flooding.

According to a report by Chinese news agency Xinhua, China has been sharply increasing its output of gold and silver coins to meet seemingly ever-increasing popular demand for precious metals as people buy to protect against perceived rising inflation. Indeed it has more than doubled the maximum issuance for 2011 for some popular gold coin sizes from its previously announced levels.

Extorre Gold Mines announced that it has entered into an agreement pursuant to which a syndicate of underwriters led by TD Securities Inc. (the "Underwriters") has offered to purchase, on a bought deal private placement basis, 2,400,000 common shares (the "Shares") of the Company at a price of $10.50 per Share (the "Issue Price") for total gross proceeds of $25,200,000 (the "Offering"). The net proceeds from the Offering will be used for exploration and development of the Company's mineral projects in Argentina and for general working capital purposes.

Silver Predator announced that it has signed an option to acquire a 100%-interest in 125 State of Alaska mining claims comprising the Illinois Creek silver-gold district located in west-central Alaska. The past-producing Illinois Creek Mine lies in the southern Kaiyuh Mountains in west-central Alaska about 30 kilometers east of the Yukon River and the small village of Kaltag and 90 kilometers south of the town of Galena.

Power supplies have returned to normal in Chile's northern mining heartland after a power grid failure hit some of the world's biggest copper mines earlier on Sunday, the mining minister said. Chilean Energy and Mining Minister Laurence Golborne told Reuters power supplies were back to "100 percent" and that the impact on production in the top global copper producer was expected to be minimal.

The import of gold and silver by India has risen by a whopping 222% between April and May 2011, as compared to a year ago. In the month of May alone, imports were a staggering $9 billion, with gold demand growing 25%. "Even as inflation and a widening trade deficit to $15 billion in May continues to weigh on the minds of Indian investors, the demand for fresh gold has continued to grow."

Shares in junior precious metals miner Silver Sun Resources Corp. spiked 10% on Friday after becoming the sole owner of the Cherry Hill Mining Company, a fellow Californian gold miner. The Vancouver company's stock is up just short of 50% on the TSX-Venture exchange in 2011. Silver Sun is in the final stages of development of its gold project in Yreka, California and engaged in an on-going work programme in Mexico's prolific Zacatecas silver district and at a newly-acquired silver project Yoreme in Sonora state.

Australian junior miner Alcyone Resources has poured its first silver bullion from its 100%-owned Texas silver and polymetallic project in Queensland it acquired 18 months ago, after starting in early April this year to re-irrigate the existing silver-rich heaps at the Twin Hills mine. Alcyone says its forecast cash operating cost is around A$15/ounce which provides strong margins with the silver price hovering above A$30/ounce. It expects to start full-scale operations by the September 2011 quarter at an initial annualised rate of 1.5-2.0m ounces. The ASX-listed penny stock is up some 120% so far this year.