Venezuela seizes Gold Reserve project
Company spent millions, years preparing mine site
Venezuela has taken control of the Brisas Property, a proposed mine under development for 15 years by Spokane-based Gold Reserve Inc.
Company President Doug Belanger said Tuesday representatives of CVB-Minerven, a government-owned corporation, arrived at the project Monday to take possession of Brisas. Ministry of Mines officials arrived later with notification of the government takeover.
Gold Reserve officials had turned back CVB representatives last week because they did not have the appropriate documents, but Belanger said there was no doubt they would return to follow through on a pledge in January by Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez that the mine would be seized.
Gold Reserve invested $300 million developing the Brisas deposit, which contains an estimated $5 billion in gold and copper.
Last week, the company asked a World Bank affiliate to arbitrate the dispute with the Venezuelan government over Brisas.
With formalization of the mine’s expropriation, he said, Gold Reserve will seek to extract from the government what it had worked to extract from the ground.