Centerra Gold says will sue following Mongolia's withdrawal of company's licenses

AKIPRESS.COM - Centerra Gold Inc. has released a statement following the September 10 decision of the Ulaanbaatar court to revoke the company's exploration licenses of the company, if the situation will continue in this way, News.mn reported. The company said the government of Mongolia issued licenses on the Noyon mountain in 2008 with 34 percent ownership of the project; 66 percent is owned by the Mongolian government. The mountain has about 27,667,378 tons of ores and 75,942.11 tons of gold, it noted.
"But a non-profit organization "Movement for rescue of Noyon Mountain" filed a lawsuit against the company to the Ulaanbaatar city court," the statement reads.
The company claims that it was deprived of exploration and operational licenses on the areas 372А, 431А, 5082А и 10810А that do not in fact belong to the territory of the given mountain.
In a statement, Centrerra Gold declared that its licensed territories are located in more than 10 km from the protected territory of the Noyon mountain, where allegedly valuable archeological artifacts of the Hunni Empire are found.
According to the company, the govenment of Mongolia is purposely spreading a false information, when the court's decision was not fully registered.
"If the situation will continue in this way, the company will sue in accordance with the International Treaties on the Encouragement and Mutual Protection of Investments, which Mongolia joined," the statement reads.