CdA Mines begins Bolivia project
Coeur d’Alene Mines Corp. has started construction on a $29 million tailings facility for a silver mine in the historic Bolivian mining district of Potosi.As many as 350 Bolivian employees will work on the construction of the tailings facility, which is being built by a Bolivian contractor, ICE Ingenieros S.A.Coeur d’Alene Mines hopes to finish the construction of the San Bartolome silver mine by the end next year.
The open-pit mine will be near the base of Cerro Rico, the “rich hill” that was the site of a 1545 silver strike. The strike led to the Spanish colonial settlement of Potosi, a mining center in the Andes Mountains, which is still known for its silver, tin, lead and copper production.
The San Bartolome Mine will be one of the first modern silver mines in Bolivia, company officials said. Annual production is slated at 8 million ounces of silver.
The Overseas Private Investment Corp. is providing a $135 million “political risk” insurance policy for the mine. OPIC is a U.S. agency that helps firms invest and manage risk in developing countries.
Brussels, Belgium
Microsoft to share details on Vista
Microsoft Corp. said Monday it has given security vendors Symantec Corp. and McAfee Inc. some of the information they want to make their products work with Microsoft’s new operating system, Vista.
Microsoft spokesman Tom Brookes said the software interfaces for the Windows Security Center — Vista’s new “security dashboard” — were uploaded to a Web site for software developers.
Both security companies have complained that Microsoft was withholding key information they needed to develop software compatible with Vista before it is handed over to computer manufacturers next month. Consumers should be able to begin buying the new operating system in January.
“We still don’t know if we have everything we need or not,” Symantec spokesman Cris Paden said.
On Friday, Microsoft said it had changed key aspects of Vista to soothe European antitrust worries. But the EU antitrust office refused to back Microsoft’s optimism that European concerns had been met. “The jury is out,” EU spokesman Jonathan Todd said.
The EU and Microsoft have fought for years, and the 25-nation bloc levied a $613 million fine on Microsoft in 2004.