The Sustainable Chile program charged on Oct. 31 that the Canadian company Barrick Gold is manipulating scientific reports so that the government will allow the removal of glaciers on the Chile-Argentina border, where the firm aims to establish the million-dollar gold mining project Pascua Lama. Sara Larraín, director of the non-governmental Sustainable Chile, told Tierramérica that Barrick Gold is publishing a report by unknown glaciologists who maintain that the glaciers Toro I, Toro II and Esperanza (located 660 km north of Santiago) cannot be clasified as glaciers “and, therefore, can be destroyed,” although two months earlier they said the ice masses were indeed glaciers.

The three glaciers provide the water needed for irrigating the Elqui Valley, in the central region of Coquimbo, home to 70,000 small farmers — who oppose the mining project. Barrick Gold is paying out a total of 60 million dollars to quell their protests against Pascua Lama, charges Sustainable Chile.