PNG landowners stop mine's waste dump
Papua New Guinea landowners have won a David and Goliath battle to freeze a Chinese nickel miner's construction of a massive pipeline to dump waste into the sea. The national court in Madang on Friday ordered work to stop on the nickel mine's previously approved submarine tailings disposal system. The Ramu mine in Madang Province, on PNG's northwest coast, operated by the Chinese Metallurgical Construction Group (MCC), plans to dump five million tonnes of slurry waste annually into Basamuk Bay…Tiffany Nonggorr, the lawyer representing the Madang landowners, said MCC must find an alternative to dumping the mine waste into the bay. "This injunction is a massive victory…Landowners have stopped the Chinese" she said…Despite having government and environmental approval, the proposed deep sea tailings pipeline would destroy the environment and local people's livelihoods, Mrs Nonggorr said. Judge David Cannings granted a temporary injunction forcing MCC to stop work…