ECO-TURKEY

Fatal EIA report of İliç canceled

The court annulled the EIA (Environmental Impact Assessment) report after it led to the deadly İliç mine disaster.

The report was issued by the Ministry of Environment, Urbanization and Climate Change. It claimed that the gold extracting carried out by Anagold Mining Company in İliç district of Erzincan using the cyanide method "does not pose any danger to the environment". The court found the report unlawful "because dozens of risks were not taken into account."

The complainant's lawyer stated that with this decision the conditions for the license cancellation of Anagold Maden were met. He added: "This decision was taken in line with the instructions given by the governing AKP Headquarters and the report of AKP experts. This was forced by the February 13 disaster."

What happened?

On February 13, at 14.30, Anagold Maden's "leach" pile, that is, the mountain of cyanide mud from which gold was extracted, became operational: 10 million cubic meters of waste mass set out towards Sabırlı Stream at a speed of 10 meters per second. It spread by 800 meters and covered an area of 30 hectares.

9 miners died by being buried under a cyanide swamp.

The Sabırlı stream, the Euphrates river and its dam - all the way to the Harran plain in Urfa, are now permanently poisoned with cyanide. Thousands of dead fish washed up on the shores for 40-50 days.

However, local people, defenders of life and devoted lawyers have been pointing out the disaster that has been in plain sight for many years. They were struggling to put an end to this madness: The cyanide lake, the cyanide mud mountain and the mines were located near the settlements and next to the Sabırlı stream, which flows into the vital Euphrates River.

The cyanide lake was poisoning the air and all living spaces in the surrounding area. The "modern" evaporators used also sprayed the poisonous lake water into the air in the form of a cloud of microscopic droplets. Thus, the process of spreading poison was even more intense.

The successive dynamite explosions in the mines, like a continuous chain of earthquakes, were making the world difficult for the people and other living things around them. And at the same time, it was shaking the mountain of toxic sludge: creating the risk that it would lose its integrity at any moment and flow into the environment.

Those long court processes, which lasted for years, were ended suddenly with this terrible disaster.

(News source: Yeşil Gazete August 20, 2024)