The struggle of the Ordu highlands against wild mining

The mining operation, which is taking over the entire Black Sea region, now threatens the Çobantepe, Taşkesiği, Kabatuzla, Keçiören, Adatepe Highlands of the Korgan district of Ordu and the Perşembe Highland of the Aybastı district. The people of the region are resisting this. And the determination and organization of the resistance is gradually expanding and developing.

Volunteers...

The first seeds... Volunteers against mining exploration

On August 5, at the Alankent Soğlu Obası festival, volunteers from Aybastı and Korgan residents collected signatures against mining exploration. They handed out informative brochures. They explained that the highlands will be damaged by the mining activity, water resources will be poisoned, pastures will become unusable, and livestock and endemic diversity will be dealt a blow. The Mayor of Kabataş district called for participation in the signature campaign. Volunteers, who collected signatures, said, "We received signatures from the mayors of Aybastı, Kabataş, Çamaş, Gürgentepe and Altınordu. Our struggle is both legaly and de facto."

The company is fired three times

Taşzemin Company had applied for mineral exploration in the Aybastı Perşembe and Korgan Highlands. The Ordu Governorship Pasture Board first made a negative decision. However, upon the company's application for the second time, (whatever happened) the same board made a positive decision this time.

The Ordu Environmental Association filed a lawsuit for a stay of execution against this decision. The company immediately began drilling. With that, a chain of events began, which happened again and again, exhausting the patience of the inhabitants of Korgan-Aybastı:

"To the drilling field - to the struggle!"

The public (initially under the leadership of the "Korgan Aybastı Highlands Platform", then the "Korgan Aybastı Kabataş Highlands' Protection Platform" with the addition of the Kabataş district) enters the drilling area. It smashes drilling samples. It expresses its growing anger at the mining company, which is destroying the highlands, land, grasslands and water resources. Drilling is being stopped. The company is being expelled from the area... Soon after, the teams quietly return, and the work resumes.

Patient determination

This process was repeated on September 1, September 9 and September 29. But things also changed: the number of those who resisted was increasing (rather than decreasing). Their determination was honed. They were the children of a society of fishermen whose ability to endure was steeled in the deceitful waters of the Black Sea. Then, as evidenced by the official participation of Kabataş, whose heart had been one with the resisters from the beginning: In the process, the organization of the resistance was expanding, developing and restructuring.

Women on the front lines!

Drilling activities are illegal

One thing more had changed: in the process of the stay of execution lawsuit filed after the strange decision of the Pasture Board, it turned out that the company did not have the necessary permit for drilling, and that the activity was illegal. On September 29, the residents of Aybastı-Korgan, who entered the drilling area with the call of the Korgan Aybastı Kabataş Highlands' Protection Platform, demanded an immediate end to this illegal activity and the evacuation of the area. The company's tent was dismantled, the machines were sealed and a report was made to the gendarmerie.

Evacuate the area immediately!

Finally, the decision to stay the execution

On October 8, the Ordu Administrative Court issued a "stay of execution" decision in the lawsuit filed by the Ordu Environmental Association with the request to "stop the drilling works initiated in the Korgan Highland, which will also adversely affect the Perşembe Highland". The trial lawyer, who is also a member of the board of directors of the association, pointed to the big rally organized by the Platform and said, "The decision once again showed that we were right. Now is the time to step up the struggle: we will turn our October 13 rally into a festival."

"We won!" October 13 rally

The "No to Wild Mining" rally, organized by the Korgan Aybastı Kabataş Highlands' Protection Platform, was held on October 13 in the "Wrestlers' Field" on Perşembe Highland with the participation of approximately 5 thousand people. The president of the Ordu Environmental Association, university lecturers and district mayors also attended the rally. In his speech, the spokesperson of the Platform said: "Struggle, struggle, struggle!
We have experienced the best example of this three times. Today we are experiencing the fourth:
We called three times to go to the drilling site.
We flooded and flowed.
Today we have become the sea.
Tomorrow we will be the ocean."