The Aynak mining project, which was won by the Chinese in 2007, was to have transformed the economy. There are no signs of the benefits.
A 30-year lease on one of the largest copper deposits in the world,
A 30-year lease on one of the largest copper deposits in the world, Aynak in Logar province was won by the China Metallurgical Group Corporation (MCC) in exchange for the promise of tens of thousands of jobs, a railroad (from Kabul to Hairatan), power plant, smelter and a coal mine. The Afghan government would also receive between 250 and 500 million USD royalty payment per year once production was in full swing. But mining operations that were scheduled to begin in 2013 are running years behind schedule, and MCC is allegedly trying to renegotiate the agreement terms.
Mohammad Asif Frozan, adviser to the Ministry of Mines, said the minister of mines would “soon” go to China to “settle the problems”. “It might take months for extraction since it depends on the solving of current problems,” he admitted adding, “We don’t expect that this would happen so soon because the talks are going on between Chinese MCC company and Ministry of Mines. The minister of mines would travel to China soon to solve the technical issues of contract and announce its results.”
The problems:
Aynak is also a Bronze Age and Buddhist archaeological site with temples and hundreds of sculptures. International archaeologists were given three years (between 2010-2012) to salvage as much of the artifacts as possible, but with large amounts of conservation work still undone the Ministry of Mines has extended the time period indefinitely.
Armed opponents of the government are entrenched in Azra district for the past four years, and have created problems for Aynak. In August last year a Taleban rocket attack scared workers at an archaeological site.
The government decided recently to start a major operation there. “Luckily the operations were successful because insecurity in Azra created problems for the project,” said an official.
Recentlysome media reports suggested the Ministry of Mines was considering cancelling the contract with MCC. But that is unlikely to happen. The MCC, a Chinese-government enterprise, has paid up the signing bonus of 808 million USD to the Afghan government.
