Rosia Montana, town on the brink
Roșia Montană has been thrown into a state of disarray ever since the arrival of a Romanian gold mining corporation with powerful Canadian shareholders. The corporation is planning on razing a large portion of the town and its surroundings to the ground in order to gain access to the rock there, which happens to hold the largest gold deposits in Europe.
The mining process will involve the use of highly toxic cyanide to extract the gold from the rock – arguably a necessary risk to spur economic development in the area, but potentially fatal for the local environment and the beautiful landscape.
More than 2000 people are poised to lose their homes. Many of them have chosen resettlement in big cities, but a small group of inhabitants are battling against the Company and defending their homes with all they have.
The pressure continues to rise in Roșia Montană, not least of all due to the high price of gold these days.
Within the next month, the Romanian parliament is aiming to change the mining laws in order to support the corporation in their plans to dispossess the inhabitants.
A long-standing fight of the people in a deeply divided village where the division between opponents and supporters of the mining project even splits families down the middle.
Extra media
