By L. Kalamara
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A decision this week by an administrative court in Greece in favor of Canadian multinational Eldorado Gold’s Greek subsidiary – its latest legal battle with the leftist-rightist coalition – generated a sharp reaction on Thursday by the main opposition party against the Tsipras government.
“With their anachronistic obsessions they (government) sent 500 workers and their families to the unemployment line, while at the same time damaging the country’s credibility, as it should be attracting investments to reduce unemployment,” center-right New Democracy (ND) party said in an announcement.
The biggest industrial FDI in Greece is Eldorado Gold’s gold and copper mining operations in the eastern part of Halkidiki prefecture, a verdant region of norther Greece that is a well-known tourism destination and “fruit basket”.
However, the Canadian miner’s Greek subsidiary, Hellas Gold, has faced shrill opposition by some local communities in the area, environmental advocates and a host of anti-state and anti-capitalist groups, with leftist SYRIZA also a vocal opponent before riding to power in January 2015.
The administrative court dismissed a motion by the Greek state to throw out a technical study submitted by Hellas Gold for processing condensates at its Skouries and Olympiada sites. The study had been submitted by the company to relevant state services in December 2014, a month before SYRIZA and its small right-wing coalition partner assumed the country’s reins. In its motion, the state’s attorneys claimed that an invalid technical study would violate the terms of a transfer contract.
The Skouries site has attracted most of the opposition, whereas the Olympiada site has operated for decades as a mining unit, under both state and private sector control. Mining in the region, in fact, dates to Classical antiquity.
According to market analysts, the decision creates the conditions for a full normalization of the industrial investment.
Another 699 million USD – beyond the 460 million already ploughed into the project – is reportedly budgeted by the Vancouver-based company for its Halkidiki mining operations.
