Information service of the Pontifical Mission Societies since 1927
San Salvador (Agenzia Fides) – Various social, religious, and academic groups in the country and on an international level are extremely concerned about the risky proceedings being carried out by mining companies in recent weeks. Among these associations is the Catholic Bishops’ Conference of El Salvador (CEDES), the Central American University “José Simeón Cañas” (UCA) and its Human Rights Institute (IDHUCA), the cooperative agency for sustained development “Oxfam América y la Mesa Permanente de Gestión de Riesgos,” the National Water Forum and the National Forum on Metal Mining, which includes over 100 citizen’s institutions and organizations that work in environmental protection.
According to a statement published by Caritas-El Salvador, “with the goal of placing pressure on the government to obtain permission to mine valuable metals, these mining companies are intensifying their nameless propagandistic campaign, with false and discriminatory messages that are an offense to human dignity and that violate the basic principles of advertising ethics.” Moreover, “they ridicule those who warn of the dangers of mining.” One of their main targets has been Archbishop Fernando Saenz Lacalle of San Salvador and Msgr. Richard Antall, one of his closest collaborators, as well as the Rector of UCA, Fr. Jose Maria Tojeira. These companies also encourage violent acts.
Faced with this situation, they ask that the corresponding authorities “investigate and proceed with a legal process against the mining companies that are fooling the population with a non-existent ‘green mining’” and that reject it, given its “environmental, social, and economic risk for El Salvador.”
The intense criticism that the metal mining industry in the country is receiving from these social groups, “is based on the disadvantageous cost vs. benefit relation, in which the minimal and temporary economic advantages do not compensate for the immense environmental damages, social conflicts, and loss in productivity that gold and silver mining would provoke. Moreover, the contamination of the water, air, and earth constitutes a grave violation on the right to a clean environment and is a risk to the right to life.”
They also warn that the 29 projects under study are destined for the northern part of the country, in the Lempa River Valley, and would affect the country’s main water reserve.
“As a result of the above mentioned, we express our disaccord with the metal mining in the country and ask society to join us, the Catholic Church, and the rest of the entities participating in this effort, in defending our water supply, the environment, and the life threatened by this mining,” the statement from Caritas concluded.
The Catholic Church has expressed its opposition to the mining on various occasions, in public statements, including the May 3, 2007 “Protecting Everyone’s Home.” For the Bishops, this kind of mining is one of the country’s gravest problems, along with poverty and violence. Archbishop Fernando Saenz Lacalle personally asked the government representatives not to allow these projects to pass, given the harm they will cause to the environment and to human health. In a letter written to Bishop Thomas G. Wenski of the Diocese of Orlando, President of the International Justice and Peace Committee of the United States Conference of Catholic Bishops (USCCB), in which he expresses his rejection of the project, he also mentions that “it is critical not only for the lack of drinking water that will affect the country, but also because of the contamination of water resources,” And he added that “university research studies have shown that mining that has taken place for various decades in other parts of the country, is the cause in many cases of kidney failure and other terminal illnesses.” (RG) (Agenzia Fides 29/7/2008)
