YEREVAN. – Even though the Armanis gold-polymetallic mine in Armenia’s Lori Province is not operated for the past year and a half, it continues polluting the environment, according to EcoLur NGO of the country.

This mine is located 7.5 km from Stepanavan town, and it has been operated by “Global Metals (Arm) Limited” Company, as represented by “Sagamar” CJSC, since 2011.

In 2015, the company submitted an Armanis mine expansion project for environmental expertise, received a positive review, and stopped mining for some reasons leaving a pile of waste on the road connecting the mine to Stepanavan.

According to this project, the mine shall be developed for 7 years in opencast manner and 26.6 years in closed manner. After mining is over, the project plans to place warning signs in hazardous places in a distance of 20-25 meters from the borderline of the open pit, and placing fences across the entire borderline. The road serving the open pit should have also been fenced. The throats of the mine should have been closed with metallic mines at the closure of underground mine. The tails occupying a territory of 83.4 hectares should have been covered with 157,460 cubic meters soil layer, after the development of the open mine.

EcoLur has visited the Armanis mine area and video recorded it with an unmanned aerial vehicle. It evidently shows that no recovery has been carried out in this area. The contamination with hazardous waste expands in the adjacent lands in parallel with precipitation while at the moment of recording the villagers had their cows pasturing there.

Armanis mine ore contains: gold –11,350 kg – 0.84 g/t, silver – 149,998.4 kg – 11.1 g/t, copper – 145,930.8 tons, zinc – 289,456.7 tons, lead – 168,901.4 tons.