Stephanie
Danielle Roth, 2005 Goldman
Environmental Prize Winner, Europe
(Romania), with Ouroboros
statuette
Courtesy of Goldman Environmental
Foundation
|
"Gabriel Resources and
Newmont are modern-day vampires;
who in the name of progress aim to
bleed Rosia Montana to death. Their
lust for gold has already given
rise to flagrant and crying
injustices. I refuse to accept this
and I refuse to stay silent about
this."
|
Stephanie Danielle Roth is one of
six recipients of the prestigious
international Goldman Environmental
Prize - the world's largest prize
for grassroots environmentalists.
Fighting to stop the completion of
Europe's largest open-cast gold mine,
Roth has faced numerous death threats
in her bid to save Rosia Montana -
Romania's oldest documented mining
settlement.
Granted mining rights by the Romanian
government in 2000, Gabriel Resources -
a Canadian-based company with no
previous mining experience - began work
on an open-cast gold and silver mine in
Romania's Apuseni Mountains. The plan
to mine 500,000 ounces of gold over 16
years would force more than 2,000
people to lose their homes, destroy 10
churches and 9 cemeteries, and damage
many archaeological sites including
unique Roman and pre-Roman mine
galleries, temples, and sacred
sites.
The remote
valley of Corna in Romania's
Transylvania region contains a
storybook village complete with
historic churches. It is at risk of
being completely submerged in a toxic
lake of chemical waste if the proposed
Gabriel Resources mine is developed
Courtesy of Goldman Environmental
Prize
A major investor in Gabriel Resources
is now US-based Newmont Gold - the
world's largest gold producer which
faces criminal charges around the world
for its appalling record on
environmental and social issues. The
company plans to use hazardous cyanide
compounds to separate the gold and
silver from the rock. This poisonous
metal sludge would then form a deadly
cyanide storage pond covering more than
600 hectares, held up by a 185
metre-high dam across the Aries River
valley, and immersing the nearby
village of Corna. As a result, the
Aries River- the most important water
resource in the Apuseni Mountains - is
at serious risk of pollution,
threatening the health and lives of
100,000 people.
To prevent this wide-scale
destruction, Roth organised the first
environmental protests in modern-day
Romania. Working as a volunteer for
Alburnus Maior - an NGO based in Rosia
Montana opposing the mining development
- Roth mobilised hundreds of thousands
of Romanians, and created a coalition
of local non-governmental
organisations, archaeological
specialists, academics and clergy to
fight the mining proposal. The battle
to save Rosia Montana has now become
the country's largest civil
movement.
Roth has also worked internationally
to win support for her campaign and
Romania's much wanted accession to
European Union now hangs in the
balance. The project is in clear breach
of various EU Directives and Article 41
of the European Parliament's most
recent resolution on Romania's progress
towards EU Accession states that:
"[Parliament] expresses its deep
concern [that] …the Rosia Montana mine
development poses a serious
environmental threat to the whole
region." Although European leaders have
agreed to sign an Accession Treaty with
Bucharest in April 2005, membership
will not be granted if Romania fails to
comply with its reform programme to
address corruption, poverty, and
environmental and social issues.
In
October 2002
, the International
Finance Corporation (IFC) - the
World Bank's private lending arm -
pulled out of the Rosia Montana mining
project. In a statement issued by the
World Bank Group, significant social
and environmental concerns were given
as reasons for its withdrawal.
Established in 1990, the Goldman
Environmental Prize is awarded each
year to environmental heroes from six
continental regions. Widely recognised
as the Nobel Prize for the environment
and endorsed by more than 100 Heads of
State, this prize rewards grassroots
activists for their outstanding work in
protecting the environment and
campaigning to preserve vulnerable
natural habitats. Often described as
voices in the wilderness, Goldman prize
winners have often taken great personal
risks to safeguard the environment.
"Roth's fearless tenacity in the face
of death threats and corruption has
inspired and mobilised 1000s of people.
Working to fight exploitation and
environmental destruction, Roth is a
tireless campaigner with a dedication
to hard work that I have never seen in
other people," Herwig Schuster,
Greenpeace, Central/Eastern Europe.
The 2005 Goldman Environmental Prize
of $750,000 will be presented to six
winners in San Francisco on Monday 18
April 2005. Roth will dedicate her
prize money to the campaign to save
Rosia Montana.
read
more on the Goldman
Prize site
read
more about the mining
project
read
more
about the the winners of
2003
and
2004
.
|
