Mining giant Glencore’s operations in Peru and Colombia continue to threaten Indigenous communities and cause extensive environmental damage despite the company’s public pledges to mitigate harms, according to three new reports by advocacy organizations. European banks are also among the top investors in these mines, according to their findings. The Switzerland-based miner has a long history of human and environmental rights abuses. In the past decade, it has been entangled in land rights violations, numerous bribery and corruption investigations, court cases, and denunciations by local and international officials, including the U.N. special rapporteur on human rights and the environment. Since 2013 and continuing to this day, Glenore’s Antapaccay copper mine in the Peruvian province of Espinar has reportedly led to air pollution levels that exceed international safe limits. The Peruvian NGO CooperAcción, an author of one of the reports, detailed high concentrations of chlorides and sulfates in many of the surrounding rivers, such as the Salado, as well as toxic metals in local plants and animals. And in Colombia, Censat Agua Viva (CENSAT) and the Center for Research and Popular Education (CINEP), two organizations that authored another report, identified extensive environmental damage and pollution caused by Glencore’s Cerrejón coal mine in the department of La Guajira. Ever since 1975, when the mine was first owned by INTERCOR, a subsidiary of ExxonMobil, the NGOs say the mine has drastically transformed the natural landscape and affected the health of more than 336,000 people. Glencore completed its purchase of the mine in 2022.…This article was originally published on Mongabay
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