"Will Bougainville Reopen the Panguna Mine? With an independence referendum on the horizon, reopening the Panguna mine offers both attractive opportunities and terrible consequences", 22 November 2019

With the independence referendum...many local leaders admit that they would like to see the mine reopen as a way to boost revenue, yet distrust of giving a foreign mining company access again still looms large. No matter the results of the referendum, any company looking to make a buck is sure to find opposition in Panguna. This is, as long as past mistakes are not forgotten.

The Panguna mine...was...at the center of a decade-long civil war fought between the Bougainville Revolutionary Army and the Papua New Guinea Defense Force in the 1990s. The conflict cost as many as 15,000 lives and displaced 40,000 of the island's 200,000 inhabitants.

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Bougainville Copper Limited, (BCL) a subsidiary of the British-Australian resources giant Rio Tinto, owned the mine at the time of the conflict....

...[S]ome of the islanders launched a class action lawsuit in the United States against Rio Tinto.

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Former PNG Prime Minister Sir Michael Somare provided the court with a sworn affidavit stating that it was Rio Tinto calling the shots during the war.

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For years, the Bougainville government has asked the company to make contributions to help with the clean up. It has also asked Australia, as the former colonial power responsible for authorizing the mine. Rio Tinto has refused. So, too, has the Australian government.

Now...several other smaller mining companies have shown interest in resuming operations at the mine...Fortescue Metals Group Ltd...RTG Mining Group...Panguna Development Company...Callabus....

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With the independence referendum...many local leaders admit that they would like to see the mine reopen as a way to boost revenue, yet distrust of giving a foreign mining company access again still looms large. No matter the results of the referendum, any company looking to make a buck is sure to find opposition in Panguna. This is, as long as past mistakes are not forgotten.

As Bougainville Revolutionary Army leader Francis Ona once said, "Land to us is our lifeline, and we cannot be separated from it."