Dig gold in Ghana at your own risk, warned Chinese miners after arrests

General News of Tuesday, April 23, 2019

Source: scmp.com

2019-04-23

Chinese citizens working in Ghana's gold mines will not be protected by their country of origin if they are trapped in the crackdown on illegal mines, Chinese Foreign Ministry warned after Chinese nationals were arrested for working in the African nation.

Although Ghana allows licensed companies to operate a small-scale gold mine, "it is still illegal for foreigners" to work in the sector "and they will not be protected by Ghanaian laws," he said. Monday the Ministry on the WeChat Chinese social media application. .

Some Chinese citizens have been arrested "in recent days" for working illegally in Ghana's gold mines, without giving details.

The Chinese Embbady in Ghana warned miners earlier this year that they risked being arrested as the local government intensified its crackdown on overseas operations.

An official at the consular affairs department of the embbady, ​​who refused to be identified, said he could not say more about it.

The Ministry's Consular Affairs Press Center in Beijing could not be reached for comment.

Chinese miners have been flocking to Ghana, Africa's second-largest gold exporter and tenth in the world for several years.

At the height of the miners' gold rush in 2012-13, more than 30,000 Chinese mined Ghanaian gold, according to a report previously published by the Global Times, a newspaper owned by the Communist Party spokesman, People's Daily. About 90 percent of them are from Shanglin County, Guangxi Zhuang Autonomous Region in southern China, the report said.

But their numbers have dwindled in recent years, as Ghanaian authorities intensify their raids on illegal mining, said Su Zhenyu, secretary-general of the China-Ghana Mining Association, quoted by the government as saying. ;agency.

Last month, the news site Asia by Africa reported that 50,000 Chinese migrants had flocked to Ghana in recent years, attracted by the country's unprotected mineral wealth and the dizzying price of gold.

Ghana's President, Nana Akufo-Addo, said that illegal mining by Chinese citizens is a major concern.

"Ghana and China have a strong relationship," he told the Nikkei Asian Review last month. "However, we have a big problem [with] China's involvement in illegal mining activities in Ghana [and] we decided to do something about it. "

In June 2013, 124 Chinese citizens were arrested by Ghanaian police for illegally searching for gold.

The arrests prompted the Chinese Foreign Ministry to urge the Ghanaian authorities to enforce their laws – in a civilized way – to protect residents from plundering their resources by foreign invaders.

Beijing has long been determined not to let relations with Ghana undermine the arrests of illegal gold miners.

It wants to protect its growing trade relations with one of the brightest economic stars in Africa.

Trade between Ghana and China was more than US $ 6 billion in 2017, up 11.7 percent from the previous year, according to an article posted on the Ghana Web website.

It also seeks to defuse any problem that may provoke public resentment of its citizens doing business in Africa or threatening its expanding trade relations with the continent.