[Excerpt translation from Spanish provided by Business and Human Rights Resource Centre]

…In a logistical operation of great dimensions, the transportation of 100 tons of mercury from the Veladero mine in San Juan to the port of Santo Antonio in Santiago de Chile began. The residual contaminant, which was stored in a liquid state since 2012, travels in bottles of steel, placed in containers, that are being transported in trucks. It will travel through six provinces of the Argentinian northwest until they reach their final destination in a salt mine in Germany, where it will remain buried…”It is the first time that we are going to export mercury to its final disposition”, said an exclusive to Clarín Marcelo Álvarez, executive director of the Minera Andina del Sol, the commercial alliance with the Canadian Barrick Gold and the Chinese Shandong Gold, which operates the Veladero mine, which in between 2015 and 2017 had three accidental cyanide spills…The transportation to Europe costs 1,5 million dollars for each 100 tons, and is being carried out by the Swiss company Batrec, which specializes in the transport of dangerous residual materials. The operation is monitored by the environmental police of each distinct jurisdiction that it crosses by…With the changes brought forth by international treaties, Barrick asked for authorization so that the Ministry of Mining at San Juan can modify the mercury’s conditions, to consider it a mining by-product to a dangerous residual, and to export it from the country. “Now, it’s about how the dangerous residual and how it is available for its disposal for life”, detailed Álvarez.