[ad_1]
The road to Guatemala's largest nickel mine is barely visible through a cloud of red dust brewed by 25-tonne trucks loaded with ore.
A cyclist emerges from the sweltering mist that slips between the trucks. On his back, he is carrying a bundle of firewood. Glasses protect her eyes, a bandana covers her nose and mouth.
Manuel Shock, a graying grandfather, lives in the colony of El Paraíso, almost opposite the Fenix mine gates. Each package sells for 10 quetzals (£ 1). It's a precarious life.
"A lot of people have died on the road," says Shock. "Trucks overturn them and often they do not stop. Many people. Someone died right there. Drivers, they do not do anything. But God, he knows. "
In many ways, perilous roads are the least of its problems.
Exporting its minerals to Europe and beyond, where they are used in steel mills producing stainless steel, Fenix is at the center of claims concerning water and air pollution and fears of political corruption.
As careers grow, hundreds of families in the surrounding Mayan villages fear being expelled and losing the environment that makes them live.
In September 2011, Fenix was acquired by the Solway group, a company owned by Europeans and managed from Switzerland. Theirs is a messy business. Their diggers work night and day, cut down trees and excavate 2.6 million tonnes a year.
On the shores of Lake Izabal, the largest stretch of freshwater in the country, boilers suck up smoke seven days a week. Chimneys – equipped with filters designed to reduce impurities – are part of a factory restored by Solway. He turns the ore into ferronickel.
Dozens, sometimes hundreds of trucks a day, transport ore and ferronickel to the Caribbean port of Santo Tomás de Castilla.
The town of El Estor, once sleep-laden, with its lovely lakeside promenade, is now the focus of a vicious environmental conflict.
The arrival of the company has created 3,000 jobs. But it also caused conflict.
He faces charges – which he denies – of being involved in a blackout of information after the Attorney General laid charges in a case brought by Solway against two journalists working for Guatemala's information website, Prensa Comunitaria.
Map
Green Blood, an international media consortium led by the French group Forbidden Stories, has gathered to continue its investigation.
Working alongside Prensa Comunitaria, El País, Le Monde and other media, the Guardian has uncovered new evidence that will raise new questions about the impact of the mine on the environment.
The Guatemalan Supreme Court ruled in February that the local people had not been duly consulted when the Fenix license was renewed in 2006 under the former owners. Solway is appealing. If the decision is confirmed, he will have to undertake a listening exercise.
Working with a translator, we talked to the villagers about their concerns. Many report similar problems: water scarcity, crop growth problems, coughs, rashes and eye infections.
To date, no scientific study has conclusively linked these issues to mine operations. Solway says that he is careful not to destroy the water sources and his own research shows that the air quality has not deteriorated since the reopening of Fenix.
But many people do not trust the company or the few government studies conducted, believing that the state is ready to prioritize the needs of the industry before theirs.
The Solway permit covers a particularly sensitive area: 247 km2 of densely wooded hills housing 20 settlements belonging to the Q'eqchi people. Some own their land, others are considered squatters. A number of them are based on or near rich nickel deposits.
When settlers from El Paraíso moved here, the mine, which dates back to the 1970s, was dormant. They reached an agreement with the government land bank, Fondo de Tierras, set up their huts and planted maize.
But their crops are failing. First, the plants were stunted; now, Shock says that they die as seedlings. Shock accuses the dust.
Swirling from trucks climbing the road and open quarries, he falls on the roofs. The corrugated iron that should last up to 14 years is rusted in four.
Choc's neighbors lift their children's t-shirts and report rashes on the back, neck and chest.
This summer, the stream on which El Paraíso depends for its drinking water was dry.
People here have an expression: the mine, they say, is "eating the mountain".
While Solway plans to dig for the next two decades, communities say they are in danger.
Some does not appear on any official map. In the eyes of the authorities, they simply do not exist.
Until recently, Q'eqchi 'were largely internal migrants. Now they join the caravans. In December, a seven-year-old girl from Q'eqchi died in US Customs custody in El Paso, Texas.
Stories of death and violence swirl around Fenix. In 2012, three students drowned in a nature reserve owned by Solway.
Last week, the company's biologist was found guilty of intentional homicide and his former employer was ordered to pay family reparations. In 2016, when a refinery boiler exploded, seven employees were killed.
Last year, the village leader of El Gosen was kidnapped and imprisoned. During his absence, his people were expelled from land that Solway says was squatting. The company offered them financial assistance to relocate.
Tensions in El Estor worsened in March 2017, when a red stain spread across the lake. Fishermen blamed the refinery.
Their unions decided to picket on Fenix Road. The trucks stopped rolling. Women and children were trapped in the "colony", a complex surrounded by a high wall where miners work with their families.
As the colony began to run out of food and piles of untransferred ore rose, pressure on local authorities to end the conflict intensified. After a brief truce, the negotiations collapsed and the demonstrators set up a new blockade.
El Estor is still shocked by the actions that were taken afterwards.
According to witnesses, on May 27 at 2 pm, the police first fired tear gas and opened fire. Fisherman Carlos Maaz Coc had picked up a stone. He was shot in the chest before it left his hand. The police fled after wounding another protester, leaving Maaz's body on the tarmac.
Instead of withdrawing, the mine lobbied the prosecutor for a lawsuit against the protesters. The leader of the fishermen's union was eventually arrested by police in Puerto Barrios prison. His deputy was detained there for a year and is now on bail.
Arrest warrants were issued against two indigenous journalists working for Prensa Comunitaria, Carlos Choc and Jerson Xitumul. The prosecutor added their names to a list of fishermen accused of holding captive company personnel.
Shock was hidden and Xitumul was placed under house arrest. The case against Xitumul has since been dismissed and at the beginning of the year the prosecutor and the company demanded the dismissal of the charges against Choc, but the judge who oversaw the case refused, asking new surveys.
And then it's hanging out.
The priest of El Estor, who was three meters from Maaz when he saw the police open fire, is horrified by the events.
"It's the modus operandi of many companies to impose fear, to call you a delinquent … and it seems that the strategy has worked for them," said Father Ernesto Rueda Moreno. "The union is completely eclipsed."
Among his parishioners, he says, there is "almost complicit silence".
The company says it has a duty to protect its staff and families and not to try to silence journalists or harass them.
A day after the shooting, the government held a press conference to announce that a proliferation of algae had made the waters red. His report attributed pollution from agriculture and wastewater.
But concerns about the refinery persist.
A recent water analysis obtained by Prensa Comunitaria for this survey raises new questions. Produced by Amasurli, the government-funded sustainable management agency of the Izabal Basin, he concludes that the lake is experiencing "eutrophication", an excessive wealth of nutrients leading to the proliferation of plant life.
In 2018, nitrite salts were 54 times higher than the "normal" level (safe) and phosphates were twice as high. The results for 2017, the year of the red spot, are missing. Amasurli's explanation is that surveillance was "not done" that year.
What causes eutrophication? The report concludes that this is due to agriculture and wastewater. Independent experts agree with that. A 2019 map of 11 water quality monitoring stations shows that the highest concentrations of nitrites and phosphates were detected at the mouth of two channels in connection with the refinery.
One is an entrance channel that takes water from the lake to cool the ovens. The other is an outlet channel, built to bring water back to the lake.
Nobody has an explanation for the results of the channels. Solway insists that it does not use nitrites or phosphates in its processes. Its outlet channel has been closed since the reopening of the refinery in 2014.
Nevertheless, Oswaldo Calderón, regional director of the Fundaeco environmental protection agency, remains concerned about Izabal and its fauna. The manatees were once a common site in El Estor – they appear on the logo of the town hall. Now, he says, they're moving away. He questioned intensive farming and the recent arrival of fish cages in the lake, which introduce new chemicals such as fertilizers. But he also has concerns about the mine.
"The lake is really threatened. We have mines, bananas, sugar cane, and they started using them for fish farming. If this continues, my fear is that it will become a swamp.
Fundaeco plans to file a lawsuit against Fenix.
"If I could, I would just close the mine," Calderón said. "This business only creates social conflict."
Drink water
On the banks of the Trincheras River, a group of mayors of the community met. They live at the foot of a second nickel mine belonging to Solway, called Montúfar.
A channel draining the rainwater from the quarries pours red soils into the river. The company says its tests indicate that the presence of suspended solids – an indicator of water quality – does not exceed the limits set by the government.
Mayors are more worried: 7,000 people depend on their drinking water for waterfalls near the Solway workplace. Over-farming and deforestation have an impact here. But communities continue to see the mine as part of the problem.
"The cascades are slowly drying out," said Mario Sandoval, Mayor of Nehua. Since the start of the rains, he says, the number of liters per person per day has not increased compared to the trough recorded in the summer. "If the government does not remove this mine from here, we are ready to put an end to it. Soon, they will remove this side of the mountain.
Back in El Estor, the Q'eqchi leaders gathered for their first meeting since the blockade. Juan Putal May, 52, lives in Semuc, in the license area. Main spiritual guide of his village, he was born and raised here. In recent years, he has seen changes.
"The formerly wet and green areas are now dry and bare. It does not rain as much. Agriculture is over.
Ten years ago, a single "task" or parcel would produce 30 kg (70 lb) of corn. Today, 16 plots are needed to harvest the same amount. Chili will not grow anymore; lemons shrivel on the tree.
Families leave for the Petén region further north. Dust is another problem: those left behind have rashes and sore eyes.
Aníbal Coti, who runs the El Estor Health Center, said conjunctivitis, bronchitis and asthma were on the rise.
"Here, in the morning, the dust begins to fall as if it's volcanic sand," says Coti. "It is unfortunate that the Ministry of Health does not comment on that."
Solway says that Fenix takes every precaution not to harm the environment. The refinery's chimneys are monitored to ensure that the level of dust they expel remains within legal limits.
Dmitry Kudryakov heads the company's operations in Guatemala.
His foremen are young and bright and seem enthusiastic about their work. In the hallway, on the outside, there are football trophies from community matches.
"When I arrived in 2012, the engineers could not get into some communities because they looked at us with caution," he says. "Today, no community prevents us from entering. We can go play a football game. We are invited to celebrate a wedding, Mother's Day … "
With regard to health problems, Kudryakov said that there was no obvious relationship with the company's activities. "In communities," he adds, "because of the economic situation they have, they do not have access to modern health. [care] As Europeans, they have no plants to purify their ordinary water, they have many obvious factors that affect health. "
Asked socially about water shortages, Mr. Kudryakov explained that rivers and streams fluctuate with "life cycles" as do crops. He says the mine is not to blame.
"We have identified all the sources, in an area of possible influence … and we are obviously not working close to them. If necessary, we plant trees closer to the springs. "
In the Guatemalan capital, Luis Chang, Minister of Energy and Mines, points to external factors. "I would like to know what European countries are doing to end climate change, which is one of the main factors driving the reduction in the absorption of water sources."
He rejects aboriginal complaints based on perception and rumor rather than facts. The solution, he believes, is dialogue.
Despite Kudryakov's protests, tensions remain strong in El Estor. The last few weeks have seen sporadic blockages. In El Paraíso, Choc says he's staying there. "Until our death, it is our home. We can not leave. We will last until the end.
Source link
