ISLAMABAD: The Supreme Court of Pakistan told that gold and copper deposits in some areas of Reko Diq lay only 20 feet below the surface.
Director General of Minerals Irshad Ali Khokhar, who visited the exploration site in 2008, said a foreign firm which had conducted a feasibility study drilled about 500 bore-holes, 100 to 300 feet deep and each three inches thick, to determine the depth of the deposits.
A three-judge SC bench, headed by Chief Justice Iftikhar Mohammad Chaudhry, is hearing a set of petitions challenging the possible award of a contract to the Tethyan Copper Company (TCC), a Canadian and Chilean consortium of Barrick Gold and Antofagasta Minerals, for exploring gold and copper in Reko Diq.
Reko Diq, a small desert town in Chagai district of Balochistan, sits over what is called the Tethyan copper belt and is said to have the world`s fifth largest deposit of gold and copper. Located within a major mineral zone with most of its parts in Pakistan, the Tethyan belt enters into Pakistan from China and after passing through Gilgit-Baltistan and Balochistan ends up in Iran via Afghanistan.
Khalid Anwar, the counsel for TCC, told the court that the army was aware of the exploration activity in Chagai and was given a thorough briefing.
“The military has never objected to the mining activity or expressed any reservation because they realise that any interference will affect Balochistan`s economy,” the counsel said in reply to a question about the strategic importance of the area. He said that the strategic interests of the area had been taken into consideration. Balochistan`s Advocate General Salahuddin Mengal said he would share with the Supreme Court the feasibility study carried out by the TCC on the prospects of mining for copper and gold in Reko Diq.
In a presentation to the Supreme Court on Jan 25, TCC`s Acting CEO Gerhard van Borries had offered to share the feasibility study but only in-camera because it dealt with the cutting edge technology and processes needed to extract copper and gold and, therefore, fell under the intellectual property right.
Advocate Abdul Hafeez Pirzada, the counsel for the BHP, informed the court that being a principal party the Balochistan government had taken control of the entire project. He said the Balochistan Development Authority (BDA), with which the BHP had entered into a joint venture agreement in the 1990s, was out of scene now.
The BDA and BHP had in June 1993 entered into the agreement which was approved by the then chief minister of Balochistan. Before reaching the agreement, Mr Pirzada said, the law department had been taken on board.
