‘Communities not important’ says former Colombia mining head in leaked video

Latin American Herald Tribune reports Venezuela's first shipment of 160 – 180 tonnes of gold held abroad was received at Maiquetia International Airport outside Caracas on Friday night. In operation that also involved tanks and aircraft, the first of some 15,000 standard 400-ounce bars wrapped in black plastic inside a caravan of armoured vehicles escorted by 500 soldiers then made its way to the bank’s headquarters downtown. President Hugo Chavez announced in August that the South American country plans to repatriate its gold reserves held by banks in England, the US, Canada and France. The Central Bank of Venezuela already holds 154 tons of bullion domestically.

Reuters reports schools and businesses were closed and Peruvian police fired tear gas on Friday to break up a protest at Newmont Mining and Buenaventura's proposed $4.8 billion Conga gold mine as the government tried to mediate a bitter environmental dispute over the project. Residents in the northern city of Cajamarca which has more than 200,000 residents (pictured), led by the president of the region,  say a new mine – adjacent to South America’s largest gold mine Yanacocha – will harm agriculture and livestock by relocating water supplies.  Conga would be the biggest investment ever in Peru mining.

Brazil has temporarily banned Chevron from drilling in the country after it caused an oil spill off the coast of Rio de Janeiro, raising doubts about the company’s role in one of the industry’s biggest investment programmes. Late on Wednesday, Brazil’s National Petroleum Agency (ANP) accused the U.S. company of negligence late on Wednesday, announcing it would suspend all of Chevron’s drilling until it clarified the reasons for a spill that released almost 3,000 barrels of oil into the sea earlier this month. Analysts believe that the Brazilian government is keen to make an example of Chevron as a warning to other foreign companies looking to take a share of Brazil’s pre-salt reserves, which are estimated to contain as much as 50bn barrels of oil.

Peru's government urged opponents of Newmont Mining's proposed $4.8 billion Conga gold mine project to refrain from violence during a protest scheduled for today as President Ollanta Humala scrambles to solve the bitter dispute.

Fears over the direction of Vale, the world’s biggest miner of iron ore by volume, renewed this morning as the company’s CEO Murilo Ferreira announced late on Monday that he will submit to the Board of Directors a proposal for a new structure of the Executive Board. Investors have been particularly cautious of management changes at the miner since Brazil’s government helped push out Roger Agnelli, Vale’s former chief executive, at the end of his mandate in May. The company said that the restructuring aims to establish an operational model with clearly defined roles and responsibilities for each business unit.

They were supposed to be the vessels that will ferry iron ore from the world's largest exporter to the world's largest customer of the crucial steelmaking ingredient. Instead, Vale's new fleet of iron ore carriers could remain moored at home docks because the Chinese don't want them. Bloomberg reports that the Vale Brasil, the largest bulk carrier ever built, was designed to carry iron ore to China from Vale's mines in South America, but it has not made one voyage in six months of operation. The reason? China is refusing to accept the vessel, which is part of a fleet of 19 ships that Vale is buying from Chinese and Korean shipbuilders in deals valued at $2.3 billion.

Boardroom chairs are being shifted at two large diversified mining companies, Vancouver-based Teck Resources and Brazilian powerhouse Vale SA, the world's second largest miner. Teck announced yesterday that Marcia Smith, Vice President, Corporate Affairs, will replace Doug Horswell as Senior Vice President, Sustainability and External Affairs. Horswell, staging into retirement, will work half-time in the company's Zinc and Health program. Meanwhile, Vale announced that coming this Thursday, CEO Murilo Ferreira will submit to the Board of Directors a proposal for a new structure of the company's Executive Board. Among the changes, the most high-profile is the replacement of CFO Guilherme Cavalcanti with Tito Martins, who currently runs Vale’s base metals division.

Chilean Government urged state-owned copper producer Codelco and Anglo American Plc (AAL) to seek an out-of court resolution to a contractual dispute over the sale of a stake in Anglo’s mine and smelting assets in the country. Codelco's Chief Executive Officer Diego Hernandez sai today in a public event that while the company is prepared to negotiate with Anglo, the starting point of any discussions would be to recognize Codelco’s right to the full 49 percent stake.

TORONTO, Nov. 18, 2011 /CNW/ - Guyana Goldfields Inc. (TSX: GUY) ("GGI" or "the Company") is pleased to announce today that it has signed a Mineral Agreement ("MA") with the Government of Guyana and has received the Mining License for the Aurora Gold Project, as previously promised through its Memorandum of Understanding ("MOU") agreement with the Guyanese Government (see press release dated October 5, 2011). This is the first large-scale mining license to be issued in the gold sector in Guyana since 1991.