Montreal, Canada – Investors may be exposed to severe risks by maintaining their investments in the Canadian mining company Belo Sun, a new report published today by Amazon Watch shows. The Risks of Investing in Belo Sun: How the Canadian gold mining company’s plans for the Brazilian Amazon pose significant risks to investors, biodiversity, and forest guardians, launched at the UN Convention on Biodiversity’s 15th Conference of the Parties (COP15), is an alert about the Belo Sun Mining Corp. and its Volta Grande Project (VGP) in the Brazilian Amazon. It exposes not just risks to financiers but also the severe impacts the project portends for surrounding communities, biodiversity, and climate stability in the Amazon region.
Currently under development in the Volta Grande do Xingu, or the Xingu River’s Big Bend, the VGP has been characterized by misleading claims from Belo Sun executives, legal controversies, community opposition, and concern by scientists and mining experts about the project’s potential impacts on biodiversity and the environment. If built, the project would be the largest open-pit gold mine in Brazilian history, threatening the already fragile Amazonian ecosystem that local communities rely on for their lives and livelihoods.
“Belo Sun’s Volta Grande Project is a disaster for the Amazon, its biodiversity, and the people of the Volta Grande region. Belo Sun continues to mislead about the grave risks this project poses, even while they violate communities’ rights to Free, Prior, and Informed Consent, and their environmental license remains suspended. No investor should even think of touching this company”, said Gabriela Sarmet, Amazon Watch Brazil Campaign advisor. Sarmet will be presenting the risk assessment in a panel with Indigenous leaders and mining experts, on December 9th, in the Pavillon Sherbrooke de l’UQAM.
“We are putting any institution or company looking to invest in or acquire Belo Sun on notice: this is a bad actor selling a dangerous project. Anyone looking to get involved with them will be shouldering serious risk and will be complicit in the continued threats to the Amazon rainforest, Indigenous and traditional peoples, and the global climate”, said Christian Poirier, Amazon Watch Program director, who will be in Montreal leading an action outside the Royal Bank of Canada to alert Belo Sun financiers (photos will be available here).
Read the report and executive summary here.
Belo Sun Out of the Amazon Campaign in Montreal | CBD Events
ACTION: STOP FINANCING AMAZON DESTRUCTION
Amazon Watch will stage a brief protest outside of the Royal Bank of Canada to denounce the bank’s financing of Belo Sun, alongside Brazilian Indigenous delegates representing the Association of Brazil’s Indigenous Peoples (APIB), members of the Rainforest Action Network, and other allies.
When: DECEMBER 8, 2022 – 2 pm EST
Where: Royal Bank of Canada – 1 Place Ville Marie, Montreal, Quebec H3B 3Y1
PANEL: WILL CANADIAN MINING DESTROY THE AMAZON? UNDERSTANDING BELO SUN PROJECT’S THREATS TO BIODIVERSITY LOSS
The panel will bring together Indigenous Brazilian leaders, Canadian research, and civil society representatives to discuss the multiple threats this industrial gold mining project presents to the Amazon rainforest and its people. It’s confirmed the participation of Dinamam Tuxá, coordinator of the Association of Brazil’s Indigenous Peoples (APIB); Puyr Tembé, president of the Federation of Indigenous Peoples of Pará (FEPIPA); Bel Juruna, Indigenous leader from Volta Grande do Xingu (via zoom); Joan Kyuek, Community organizer, Canadian researcher and author of Unearthing Justice (via zoom), Gabriela Sarmet, Amazon Watch Brazil Campaign Advisor; Viviana Herrera, Mining Watch Canada, Latin America Program Coordinator, and Christian Poirier, Amazon Watch Program Director.
The event is organized by Amazon Watch and MiningWatch Canada, in partnership with APIB (the Association of Brazil’s Indigenous Peoples), FEPIPA (Federation of Indigenous Peoples of Pará), ANMIGA (National Articulation of Ancestral Warriors Women), and with the support of Earthworks and Committee for Human Rights in Latin America (CDHAL).
When: DECEMBER 9, 2022 – 3:30 – 5 pm EST / 5:30 – 7pm BST
Where: Salle polyvalente (SH-4800) Pavillon Sherbrooke de l’UQAM, 200 rue Sherbrooke Ouest, Montréal, QC H2X 1X5
CollectifCOP15 event: https://bit.ly/3inI5oU
