Guinea charges 60 people with killings in a gold mine riot
Guinea has charged 60 people with murder, theft, and setting fire to property at the privately owned Weily Mining company in the gold-producing Siguiri region in the northeast, officials said on Friday.
In a statement, Siguiri’s public prosecutor Ibrahima I. Camara said that unrest broke out on October 4 when people there demanded the release of 17 people who were being held for vandalizing the same spot earlier that day.
Ten buses, two pickup trucks (one belonging to the gendarmerie), and two buildings were set on fire by protesters who broke into the mine. The report also said that two people were killed and several others were hurt.
Some of the charges are willful burning, property damage, and helping to commit murder.
Weily Mining said that the first gold was exported from the Niagassola mine in September 2024, but they did not reply right away to a request for comment.
There are a lot of open pit gold mines owned by AngloGold Ashanti (AU.N) and a lot of illegal small-scale mining in Siguiri, which is where the fighting happened.
As a result of stricter rules, there is more unrest at mining sites in Guinea, which has the world’s biggest bauxite reserves and huge iron ore deposits at Simandou.
Since it took power in 2021, the military junta has tried to boost economic growth by renegotiating mining contracts, speeding up project development, and getting the government to make more money from Guinea’s huge natural resource wealth.
The cops and the gendarmerie will work together to look into what happened during the riot, according to the authorities.
