Weekly Report - 28 August 2014 (WR-14-34)

“This is the worst natural disaster provoked by the mining industry in Mexico’s modern history,” and it is “100% the fault of Grupo México”, the environment minister, Juan José Guerra Abud, concluded in a press conference on 26 August given with the director of the national water commission (Conagua), David Korenfeld. The mining giant Grupo México manages Buenavista del Cobre, a copper mine situated in the municipality of Cananea in the north-western state of Sonora, from which more than 40,000 cubic metres of copper sulphate acid spilt into the River Sonora on 6 August affecting 22,000 people, and thousands of hectares of crops and livestock. The spill comes just as President Enrique Peña Nieto has won congressional approval for his energy reform proposal, and has led to questions being asked about how firm his government will be with abuses by foreign investors in the energy sector.

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