No to gold mining is scribbled on the walls by the port, emblazoned on t-shirts worn by waitresses at a beach taverna and scrawled on the wooden pier where children jump into the crystal clear waters. The villagers - who make a living catering to mainly Balkan and Russian tourists who flock to Halkidikis sandy beaches - are afraid the mine will destroy their livelihood by scaring away visitors and turn the area into an industrial zone. Who will come then here to swim and eat our fish?, asked Chryssa Likaki, a 52-year-old real estate agent as she sat one evening with other residents at a waterfront cafe, a short walk from where tourists take boat rides to see Mount Athos. She and other residents argue such a pharaonic project will drain the regions water basin and pollute the water supply, send out 3,000 tonnes of dust per hour into the air and destroy the local forest. They also say cyanide used in the production process poses a health risk to the local community. Company officials counter that there will be no dust cloud, Skouries needs only 0.09 percent of Halkidikis forest, the projects have all the necessary environmental permits, the region will not be drained dry and that cyanide will be used in a nearby mining plant but not in the quantities villagers fear. But in a country where suspicion of authority runs deep, the villagers say they see no reason to believe the companys promises or that officials will hold them to it. Come on, we live in Greece, laughs Likaki. We dont trust the state. In Ierissos, a village where banners proclaim You cant buy water with all the gold in the world and Extracting gold with blood, tensions have run so high that an abandoned police station was set on fire and burned down in April last year.
Posted on: Sun, 23 Mar 2014 18:37:15 +0000
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