Dead journalists in Latin America, 2010

The Press Emblem Campaign is out with its totals for world journalist deaths in 2010 and of the 105 reporters murdered this year, 36 are from Latin America (making it the most dangerous place there is for the job) but to comment on the story like a good gringo, please follow the instructions below very carefully:

1) Wring your hands over Mexico's failed State.
2) Ignore Honduras
3) Ignore Colombia
4) Ignore Brazil
5) Make a big song and dance about the two deaths in Venezuela, even though both murders were non-work related and happened when both were victims of car robberies.

Gold Fields (GFI) and Pan American Silver (PAAS) (PAA.to): One thing in common, one thing different

One Thing In Common

Both Gold Fields (GFI) and Pan American Silver (PAA.to) (PAAS) have plenty of mine worker deaths on their track records. Here's the latest from GFI, meanwhile the 14 deaths suffered by the PAAS workforce in Peru since 2006 (in many and varied accidents) are noted here.

One Thing Different

Gold Fields shuts down its operations to investigate the deaths on its shifts. Meanwhile PAAS  clearly doesn't give a rat's ass about the people it employs and just keeps the machine rolling, never closing down to investigate its long track record of negligence. 

The mining company I'd prefer in my portfolio is the one that at least tries to make an effort on its accident rate. The company I reject out of hand is the twisting bullshitters who hide the multiple deaths behind award gongs received in other countries from other mines. Ross Beaty, do you really give a damn? Is it all just for show and the money? C'mon dude, explain why so many people have died at your mines one time, willyaz?

Why Peruvian miners should celebrate September 2000, ten years ago this month

It's fiesta material because September 2000 was the last month Peru's mining industry got through without registering a fatality in its midst.

It's funny to think that in a few weeks time Chile will be celebrating like nobody's business when the 33 trapped miners there get rescued, while in Peru nobody thinks twice about the 663 deaths due to mine accidents in its formal mining industry since January 2000 (I mean, only the good Lord knows how many more informals never came back from a day's work) . Data from here.

My very favourite part of the current Majaz/Rio Blanco court hearing

Andrew Bristow, prize shit

Right now a court case is going on the the UK to try and get to the bottom of the Majaz/Rio Blanco torture case that we've featured on this humble corner of cyberspace quite a lot. Here's my very favourite quote from proceedings so far, part of the depositions made by witnesses late last week:

The engineers José Saavedra and Darwin Palacios as well as workers Eugenio Castro and Román Tirado Villar, confirmed that the company (Monterrico Metals) coordinated the reprisal operation against the protestors.

Román Tirado, administrator of the Rio Blanco camp, kept in constant contact with Andrew Bristow Bevege, Director and General Manager of the company, who ordered the security company 'Forza' and the police to abuse and torture the protestors.

José Saavedra affirmed that "Román Tirado gave instructions to the police, the workers and to Forza about the villagers, said that they were terrorists and they had to be treated as such. He also was in charge of taking the photographs".

We always suspected Andrew Bristow to be a total shit. Now we know.

Dead reporters

Via the wires, we hear today that there were 59 journalists killed in the first six months of 2010, up from 53 in the same period of 2009, all this from the publishers, the Press Emblem Campaign. Top region for deaths was Latin America, weighing in with a full 24 of those killings. Here's the regional breakdown:

Top was Mexico, second that "now it's all back to normal, move along now, nothing to see here" bastion of wonderfullness called Honduras, third was Colombia, fourth Venezuela.

You probably only heard about the deaths in Venezuela.

The main difference between Chile's mining industry and Peru's mining industry is that........

....Chile, being the closest thing LatAm has to a serious country, takes a responsible attitude towards Health & Safety issues. Meanwhile Peru doesn't give a rat's ass about the number of people that die on the job.

Take for example the news out today from Breakwater Resources (BWR.to), that reports its Toqui mine in Chile has been closed down pending the investigation into an accidental death on site this weekend. One death = mine closed and authorities wanna know what's going on (which is how it's supposed to be, folks).

Now take the example of Pan American Silver (PAAS) (PAA.to) that has managed to see not one but 24 deaths at its operations in Peru (yeah seriously, TWENTY FREAKIN' FOUR!!) in the last ten years but its operations have never been shut down by the authorities, its accident record never questioned in the official offices and therefore has just kept on killing and killing and killing.

Hey Ross, maybe that Curly flower is telling you something after all....

Pan American Silver (PAA.to) (PAAS), the long-term pattern of fatal accidents at its mines, and Oscar Wilde

Let's kick off this post by paraphrasing the great playwright: "To lose one miner may be regarded as a misfortune, to lose twenty-four looks like carelessness."

Pan American Silver (PAAS) really likes to impress people with its growth, its profit margins and even its talk about health & safety, concern for its workforce and all such smokeblowing exercises. But beneath the shiny happy corporate façade, the record of PAAS when it comes to accidents isn't bad, it's downright awful. Here's a little list of names, dates and place to mull over:

Pan American Silver (PAA.to) (PAAS): 24 deaths in its Peru mines
Date of Accident	Mine Unit	Region	Full Name of Victim	Accident by type
09/11/2000	Quiruvilca	La Libertad	FREDY HERNAN MENDOCILLA VILLANU	Machinery Op.
09/11/2000	Quiruvilca	La Libertad	JUAN ESPINOSA CASAMAYOR	Machinery Op.
18/12/2000	Quiruvilca	La Libertad	RONALD RAUL ASTO CAMPOS	Explosion
27/03/2002	Quiruvilca	La Libertad	SEGUNDO BASILIO CASTILLO	Rock fall
06/04/2002	Quiruvilca	La Libertad	SANTOS TEODORO REYES RODRIGUEZ	Rock fall
21/10/2002	Quiruvilca	La Libertad	YSIDRO FRANCISCO GIL ARANDA	Asphyxia
30/03/2003	Quiruvilca	La Libertad	WILMER AGUILAR ROSAS	Asphyxia
07/05/2003	Quiruvilca	La Libertad	FREDY ROY VALENCIA ZAVALA	Rock fall
13/02/2004	Quiruvilca	La Libertad	PEDRO MELANEO REYES RODRIGUEZ	Electrocution
27/05/2005	Quiruvilca	La Libertad	JULIAN TANTAQUISPE MENDEZ	winch malfunction
03/09/2005	Quiruvilca	La Libertad	JULIO CELSO SOLORZANO SANCHEZ	toxic gases
27/10/2005	Quiruvilca	La Libertad	SANTOS RUPERTO LUJAN CAMPOS	Rock fall
19/03/2006	Huaron	Pasco	ABEL ANGEL PALOMINO LOPEZ	Rock fall
21/03/2006	Huaron	Pasco	EDMUNDO ANGEL SUCARI MATEO	Rock fall
23/02/2007	Huaron	Pasco	RICARDO ZACARÍAS PINO BORJA	Rock fall
25/05/2007	Quiruvilca	La Libertad	RUBÍ DANIEL INFANTES AGUILAR	Asphyxia
16/08/2007	Huaron	Pasco	JESUS ANIBAL ALBERTO ALCANTARA	Rock fall
20/12/2007	Quiruvilca	La Libertad	ROBERTO EMITERIO TOLEDO GARCIA	Rock fall
08/02/2008	Huaron	Pasco	LUCAS ANTEDORO ALVAREZ LOYOLA	Asphyxia
20/05/2008	Quiruvilca	La Libertad	EDWARD ELIVEL GIL VERA	Rock fall
26/09/2008	Quiruvilca	La Libertad	MARTIN DANIEL VELASQUES BRUNO	Asphyxia
13/11/2008	Huaron	Pasco	OSWALDO RAMIREZ GUTIERREZ	Rock fall
03/06/2009	Huaron	Pasco	ELDELFONSO ISAIAS BALVIN SIERRA	Rock fall
02/02/2010	Huaron	Pasco	PERCY YDDAR CHUCAS HUAMAN	Suction and/or burial

All data from Peru's Ministry of Energy and Mining

Yes indeed, in the space of the last ten years at its Huaron and Quiruvilca mines in Peru, Pan American Silver has seen no fewer than 24 of its workforce die in mining accidents. Now for sure mining isn't a job like needlepoint or macrame; it's a dangerous world and fatalities will happen. But when there's a never-ending line of deaths from mining units operated by the same company, you have to wonder when the phrase "accidental death" needs to be replaced by the phrase "criminally negligent". It's certainly interesting to note the different reactions to the terrible coal mining accident in the USA recently, where 29 poor souls have lost their lives (and may they rest in peace). Here we have a closely equivalent 24 people that haven't mustered up a single headline between them, but surely the slow, steady but non-stop drip drip drip of deaths at a single mine speaks far more loudly of negligent practices by the company in question than a single, tragic event?

To make matters worse, PAAS President Geoff Burns is all too aware of the poor safety record of his mining units and doesn't seem to care much. As part of a recent mail exchange with a reader of IKN, who tackled him on the deaths at Huaron and Quiruvilca (I got all the exchange here, fwiw) Burns wrote that:

"...... the health and safety of each and every employee and contractor that works at one of our mines is and always will be of the highest priority. I am informed within hours in the unfortunate event of a fatal accident, should it occur at one of our operating or development properties. Our staff if mobilized immediately and I am then provided with full details on each incident once a thorough investigation has been conducted. This information is then shared with the senior safety and operating professionals throughout our organization and we then ensure that the proper actions are taken to try and prevent recurrences and further mitigate risks to our personnel."

Well, let me tell you something, Burns; your health and safety policy way sucks and doesn't work, however much you try and talk it up. And how can H&S be of the highest priority to the company when you never report fatal accidents to your shareholders, your "prevention of recurrences" policy clearly doesn't work (and there are 24 reasons right above these words to prove that) and you never have the common decency to mention the pisspoor company H&S record in the company annual reports, unlike so many other large mining companies who are rightfully proud of their records and aren't trying to cover up the blood of its workforce?

By the way, Burns, the reason why I have all the e-mail exchange you had with the IKN reader (and now EX-shareholder of PAAS who was a shareholder at the time the exchange started) is that he got fed up waiting for you to answer him. So your IR policy sucks bigtime, too.

With something approaching irony, PAAS founder and chairman Ross Beaty this year won the Viola R. MacMillan award at PDAC, a gong handed out for mining development. Apparently, the award does not take into account everything that should be developed by a modern mining operation, such as a board of directors who pay more than simple lip service about the welfare of its workforce.

Dying to visit the Nazca Lines

monkey gonna gitcha

Today another light aircraft that takes tourists on overflights of the Nazca Lines in southern Peru crashed, the death toll at six (not three as first reported) includes the pilot and FIVE (not two as first reported) foreign tourists (as yet unidentified). So add this one to the five French tourists killed on the same trip in April 2008 and the litany of crashes at this tourist attraction over the years. You only get to hear about the ones that kill people normally, but the amount of emergency landing incidents far outweigh the bleeds/leads stories.

I've been on the overflight tour myself, as my brother will witness. I've never forgiven him for getting me on that plane (and he'll now send me a snarky mail to remind me of my face colour when we got out the craft).

Update: We now know that the crash killed seven people, including the pilot, three Peruvian nationality tourists and three Chilean nationality tourists. We offer our sincere condolences to their loved ones.

Death by natural causes, Colombian style

Jaime

Yes indeed, heartwarming news from that most enlightened of democracies, Colombia. The excellent blog Plan Colombia and Beyond breaks today's news on the Colombian Secret Service (DAS) illegal wiretapping whistleblower, Jaime Fernando Ovalle, in this way:

Posted to the website of El Tiempo, Colombia’s main newspaper, early this morning:

• “Revelations of Jaime Fernando Ovalle, key witness to resolve the case of the ‘wiretaps’ [in the Colombian government's presidential intelligence service, or DAS]“

Posted minutes ago to the website of El Tiempo:

• “Jaime Fernando Ovalle Olaz, key witness in the DAS ‘wiretaps,’ dies“

The report of his death says he died "of natural causes" by the way. Y'know, kinda 'well, it's natural that his heart stopped beating after what we did to him, isn't it?'. For the record, Jaime was trying to set the record straight about the DAS operations that illegally wiretapped NGOs in Colombia starting in 2003, who then mysteriously had key members of their organizations assassinated shortly afterwards.

Here's the link to PCAB, go see.