MEXICO CITY — Solway Funding Group, a Switzerland-based mining firm with pursuits in Guatemala, mentioned Monday it agreed with a regional courtroom’s resolution requiring the Guatemalan authorities to acknowledge the property rights of an Indigenous neighborhood.
The corporate, which was not a celebration to the case, pressured that the Inter-American Court docket of Human Rights resolution handed down Friday “doesn’t cowl the precise of the corporate to conduct mining operations within the areas outdoors the Agua Caliente neighborhood lands.”
The delineation of these lands will likely be a part of the method for the Guatemalan authorities in complying with the courtroom’s resolution, Carlos Pop, one of many attorneys representing the neighborhood, mentioned Monday.
On Friday, the Inter-American Court docket of Human Rights dominated that Guatemala violated the rights of the Indigenous Q’eqchi’ folks to property and session by allowing mining on land the place members of the neighborhood have lived no less than for the reason that 1800s.
The courtroom ordered Guatemala to undertake new legal guidelines that acknowledge Indigenous property and gave the federal government six months to start awarding a land title to the Agua Caliente neighborhood.
As of Monday, Guatemalan authorities had not commented past saying they might assessment the courtroom’s resolution carefully.
The land dispute started years earlier than Solway bought the 2 native corporations in 2011. The corporate mentioned it had not actively mined the disputed space, although Pop mentioned exploration below prior house owners had occurred there.
“Solway will help and cooperate with the Guatemalan Authorities to attain justice for the Indigenous peoples whose rights have been discovered by the Court docket to be injured,” the corporate mentioned in a press release. “We’ll assist the efforts of the Guatemalan authorities to conduct discussions with (the) Agua Caliente neighborhood because the courtroom ruling stipulates.”
Solway additionally mentioned it hoped to quickly resume manufacturing on the nickel mine after the U.S. Treasury suspended sanctions towards its native Guatemalan subsidiaries in late September.
The sanctions, unrelated to the courtroom case, had been imposed towards the businesses and two of their workers final yr for allegedly bribing judges, politicians and native officers, in accordance with the U.S. Treasury’s Workplace of International Belongings Management. The staff have been fired and Solway mentioned it had applied reforms geared toward bettering transparency and accountability.
“We’re hopeful that, now that OFAC has issued Solway a one yr license, that the Guatemalan authorities will comply with re-issue the export permits instantly. This is able to enable the Solway’s Guatemalan corporations’ nickel mines to resume their provides to the U.S. and different clients who want this useful nickel for electrical automobile batteries and different clear power makes use of,” mentioned Lanny J. Davis, a Washington D.C. lawyer representing Solway.
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