Cyanide Waste Facility Granted Positive Environmental Report, Locals 'Intimidated'

Photos: Utku Çakırözer

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The Ministry of Environment and Urbanism on April 30 granted a positive Environmental Impact Assessment report for a cyanide dam that is planned to be built in Eskişehir in central Anatolia, Republican People's Party (CHP) MP Utku Çakırözer has announced.

Koza Gold Corporation, a company currently owned by the Savings Deposit Insurance Fund (TMSF), an anti-corruption body affiliated with the Presidency, has started the construction of the dam, he said in a written statement.

The deputy also noted that local people who have been organizing petitions against the construction of the facility had to give statements to the gendarmerie after a complaint by the Koza Gold Corporation.

Çakırözer conveyed statements of Reha Önen from the Kaymaz Neighborhood. He said that he came from Eskişehir city center to Sivrihisar to give a statement to the gendarmerie for damaging the road signs owned by the company. "We say, 'Do you have camera recordings to accuse us?' They don't say anything. Their purpose is clear. They are intimidating the people to stop their resistance against this poison. But we won't stay silent."

The facility is near Kaymaz and Karakaya neighborhoods, which have a total population of 1,500. The waste dam, which will be built in the middle of two neighborhoods on an area of ​​about 40 hectares, will have a volume of 1 million 750 thousand cubic meters.

He asserted that the ministry hastily approved the project, taking advantage of the pandemic. "The people of the region, our metropolitan municipality and civil society organizations are against this dam. Eskişehir will put up a legal fight against cyanide."

"Irreversible disasters will occur"

He listed the following reasons against the facility:

When decomposing gold, poisonous heavy metals such as lead, cadmium, zinc, copper and mercury will be mixed in nature, and irreversible environmental disasters will occur.

40 hectares of hamlets will be destroyed. Husbandry will not be done.

Because an active fault line passes through the Kaymaz Neighborhood, the probability of overflow, collapse and splitting in these dams is very high in a possible earthquake.

Drinking and utility water resources and reserves will be in danger.

Environmental pollution due to all these reasons will threaten the public and environmental health of our city. This is why we are against it. (TP/VK)