Azerbaijani Lawmakers Threaten Sanctions Against France – Asbarez.com Asbarez Armenian News
Day: January 18, 2024
YEREVAN (Azatutyun.am)—Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan predicted a further boost to economic growth in Armenia on Thursday as his government was granted a minority stake in a multimillion-dollar gold mining project which it helped to freeze in 2018.
Pashinyan confirmed that the government wants to revive the project that would create hundreds of jobs and generate tens of millions of dollars in annual tax revenue.
The country’s former leadership had granted a formerly U.S.-based company now called Lydian Canada Ventures a license to develop a massive gold deposit at Amulsar in 2016. Lydian planned to start mining operations there in late 2018 and produce 210,000 ounces of gold, worth $420 million at current international prices, annually.
However, those plans were put on hold after several dozen environmental protesters started blocking all roads leading to Amulsar shortly after the “velvet revolution” that brought Pashinyan to power in May 2018. They said that the project would wreak havoc on the environment. Lydian dismissed those claims, saying that it would use modern technology that would prevent such damage.
Pashinyan made conflicting statements about the Amulsar project at the time. His administration did not revoke Lydian’s mining licenses. But it also refrained from using force to end the blockade.
The company, which claimed to have invested $370 million in the project before the blockade, filed for bankruptcy protection in Canada in 2019 before being restructured. It is now owned by two U.S. and Canadian equity firms specializing in mining.
Following the disastrous 2020 war in Nagorno-Karabakh, Pashinyan’s government signaled plans to revive the Amulsar project and started negotiating with Lydian for that purpose. The two sides reached an agreement to that effect in February 2023. Economy Minister Vahan Kerobyan announced that the U.S. and Canadian investors will give the government a 12.5 percent stake in the project in return for its pledge to manage their risks.
Pashinyan’s cabinet formally accepted the lavish donation during a weekly meeting in Yerevan.
“I think that this model of exploiting the Amulsar mine will dispel many concerns,” the premier told the meeting. “It will also give additional impetus to Armenia’s economic growth and development. And we hope that the Amulsar mine will be a platform for introducing new standards in our mining sector.”
Lydian’s Armenian subsidiary told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service that the transfer of the minority stake will allow the company to “share both successes and responsibility” with the government. It gave no precise date for the start of mining operations at the deposit located in southeastern Vayots Dzor province.
Kerobyan said last February that Lydian needs $250 million to finish the construction of mining and smelting facilities and installing other equipment there. In particular, he said, Lydian will borrow $100 million from the Kazakhstan-based Eurasian Development Bank (EDB) and another $50 million from an unnamed Armenian bank. It is not clear whether the company has raised the rest of the sum.
Reacting to the French Senate’s almost unanimous passage of a resolution calling for sanctions against Azerbaijan, a committee within the Azerbaijani parliaments called for cutting off all economic ties with Paris.
A statement adopted in response to the French resolution, which also supports the territorial integrity of Armenia, the Azerbaijani parliaments international relations committee, recommended sanctions against France.
It also goes a step further to call for freezing “any assets of French officials,” “to expel all French companies from the country, including Total,” and “to prevent French companies from participating in any projects carried out on behalf of the Azerbaijani state.”
The committee’s statement called the French Senate resolution “biased, one-sided and unfounded.”
In a vote of 336 to 1 on the French Senate on Thursday adopted a resolution supporting Armenia and demanding sanctions against Azerbaijan.
The resolution condemned the military attack carried out by Azerbaijan with the support of its allies on September 19 and 20, 2023 against Nagorno-Karabakh and calls on Azerbaijan to guarantee the right of the Armenian population to return to Nagorno-Karabakh by providing conditions that will ensure their safety and well-being.
The French lawmakers also called for the immediate and unconditional withdrawal of Azerbaijani troops from the sovereign territory of Armenia and condemned the arbitrary arrests of political leaders of Nagorno Karabakh.
The French Senate urged the government to seize the assets of Azerbaijani leaders and embargo gas and oil imports from Azerbaijan.
Categories
NPR News: 01-18-2024 5PM EST
Pakistani Retaliatory Strikes in Iran Kill at Least 9, Raising Tensions Along Border U.S. News & World Report