Shares of Canada's Gabriel Resources have climbed 16% in the week since plans by its 80%-owned Rosia Montana Gold Corp to build a massive gold mine in Transylvania received public backing from the Romanian president. Gabriel first obtained the concession in 1999 and has already spent $500 million advancing the project and has another $175 million left, but needs several more environmental approvals to establish an open-cast mine (pictured) which once in production will be Europe's largest producing 500,000oz/year.

Business Day reports De Beers expects its South Africa unit to produce 6.5 million carats this year, 1 million less than last year as the effects of mine disposals filter down. De Beers has since 2007 sold several of its South African mines including Cullinan, Jagersfontein, Namaqualand and Finsch. The board is expected to sign a potential R15bn ($2 billion) investment to extend the life of its flagship Venetia mine when a feasibility study ends next year – it would be the company’s biggest South African investment in decades.

Valued at twenty times the price of a white diamond, pink diamonds are also extremely rare with only around 50 or so put out to tender each year. Pink diamonds comprise 0.03 per cent of global diamond production and 90% come from the remote Argyle mine in Australia, owned by Rio Tinto. For every million carats of rough diamonds produced at Argyle, less than one carat will be suitable for the tender which this year will include the three-heart shaped Argyle Semper Suite (pictured).

London-listed Gem Diamonds announced Wednesday it has found the world’s 15th largest white diamond at its Letšeng Mine in Lesotho, which is fast-becoming the richest source of large diamonds in the world. The company  said the type II D 553 carat colour diamond diamond is being analyzed in Antwerp at the moment and has not been named.  Without the occasional large diamond find, the Letšeng pipe would probably be a marginal deposit, but the mine, 30% owned by the King of Lesotho, has also yielded the 603 carat Lesotho Promise turned into a $12.4 million necklace (pictured). The 493 carat Letšeng Legacy sold for $10.4 million in 2007 and the 478 carat Light of Letšeng went for $18.4 million in 2008.

The Sydney Morning Herald reports on an Australian study shows that vocational education and training (VET) prepares workers more completely for the workforce if they are instructed in the fundamentals of their industry rather than focussing on learning specific competencies.

The study looked at the mining, solar energy and computer games industries. It found the VET system could not cope with always delivering courses that were highly specific to particular companies and continuously-changing knowledge and skills. "But VET can provide people with the capability to learn and adapt to innovation-induced change," the report says.

Nautilus Minerals (TSX:NUS)(AIM:NUS) is to raise approximately US$100 million (C$98.1 million*) through a private placement of common shares to fund the development of its first project, Solwara 1, in the Bismarck Sea of Papua New Guinea. The placing will involve the issue of approximately 39 million shares to a number of investors at a price of CAD$2.52 (US$2.58) per share. Nautilus President and CEO Steve Rogers said the private placement would provide funds for the construction of the seafloor resource production system, which initially will be deployed at Solwara 1 – the company's first deepwater copper and gold project.

Actress Daryl Hannah was arrested Tuesday during a sit-in in front of the White House protesting a pipeline expansion project that would significantly increase the amount of oil the United States imports from Canada’s controversial Alberta oil sands. Image from Вени Марковски

VANCOUVER, CANADA--(Marketwire - Aug. 31, 2011) - Lithium One Inc. (the "Company") (TSX VENTURE:LI), is pleased to report the delineation of a new zone (the "North Basin") containing thick halite sequences hosting high grade lithium and potassium brine at the Sal de Vida Project at Salar del Hombre Muerto, Argentina. The five core holes in this new discovery report grades averaging 852 mg/L lithium and 10,181 mg/L potassium within the first 55 metres from surface, with no cut-offs applied. The 50 km² North Basin is adjacent to, but geologically separated from, the 170 km² Central Basin where the Company has previously defined an inferred resource¹ of 5.4 million tonnes Lithium Carbonate equivalent and 21 million tonnes potassium chloride equivalent (1,470M m³ at 695 mg/L Li and 7590 mg/L K).

MONTREAL, QUEBEC--(Marketwire - Aug. 31, 2011) - Osisko Mining Corporation ("Osisko")(TSX:OSK)(FRANKFURT:EWX) is pleased to announce that it has entered into an agreement with Caterpillar Financial ("Cat Financial") to increase its equipment leasing facility by US $56.3 million. The facility will be used to acquire additional mobile mining equipment fleet to develop the Canadian Malartic Mine and the Barnat gold deposit.