Peru’s Congress removes energy and mines minister amid sector protests
Romulo Mucho was removed from his post on Tuesday amid protests from small-scale miners in the Andean nation.
Chile’s state-owned Codelco, the world’s largest copper producer, said on Monday it offered a new contract proposal to striking workers in hopes of ending a small strike at its Andina mine.
The 83 unionized workers of the Plantas de Andina union went on strike a week ago after talks with the company over salaries and bonuses in a new contract broke down.
“This afternoon, the company presented the new offer and is waiting for it to be voted on by striking workers,” Codelco said in a statement to Reuters.
The company reiterated that the strike at Andina had not affected production and denied that it had halted its concentrator plant as alleged by the union.
The Andina mine, which produced 220,000 tonnes of copper in 2017, is in the Andes mountains near Santiago.
(Reporting by Fabian Cambero; Writing by Mitra Taj; Editing by Peter Cooney).
