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Panama will allow controversial mine to
export already mined copper to fund maintenance
[May 31, 2025] By
ALMA SOLÍS
PANAMA CITY
(AP) — Panama will allow a controversial mine that was closed after
months of protests to export more than 120,000 tons of already mined
copper concentrate to pay the costs of maintaining the inactive mine
site, government officials announced Friday. |
An aerial view of a sump at the Cobre Panama copper open-pit mine during
a press tour of the mine, owned by Canada's First Quantum Minerals, in
Donoso, Panama, March 21, 2025. (AP Photo/Matias Delacroix, File) |
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Opposition to the massive copper mine led to some of Panama’s
most widespread protests in recent years before the country's
Supreme Court rejected a deal that allowed a Canadian company to
operate it.
Toronto-based First Quantum Minerals said Friday that exporting
the material that's sitting at the site will fund maintenance
and environmental protection measures.
Panama's President José Raúl Mulino called for those steps in
March, when business groups were lobbying him to reopen the
mine. Income from the mine accounted for nearly 5% of Panama
gross domestic product the last year it operated.
“The purpose is to avoid, above all else, environmental damage,”
Trade and Industry Minister Julio Moltó said Friday. He
emphasized that the mine was not reopening, but said that the
plan would ensure the site remained safe.
The open-pit mine was temporarily closed in 2022 when talks
between the government and First Quantum broke down over
payments the government wanted. In March 2023, Panama’s Congress
reached an agreement with First Quantum, allowing subsidiary
Panama Copper to continue operating the mine in a biodiverse
jungle on the Atlantic coast west of the capital for at least 20
more years.
The deal faced opposition from those who believed Panama wasn’t
getting as much as it should and from environmentalists and
Indigenous groups who raised concerns about the mine’s impact.
Protests included a blockade of the mine’s power plant.
Protesters also blocked parts of the Pan American highway,
including a stretch near the border with Costa Rica.
On Nov. 28, 2023, Panama’s Supreme Court ruled unanimously that
the 20-year concession was unconstitutional and then-President
Laurentino Cortizo announced the start of a process to close the
mine.
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