PUL-I-ALAM (PAN): Chinese workers have warned of halting extraction activities at the Mes Ainak copper mine in central Logar province if their security was not improved, an official said on Monday.
The Mohmmad Agha district chief, Abdul Hamid Hamid, told Pajhwok Afghan News that Chinese workers had told him they would stop extraction works if their security was not strengthened.
He said sometimes rockets were fired towards the project site, delaying copper extraction process. He said another reason behind the frequent delays was the presence of historic artifacts in the area. He said the government had intensified its efforts to ensure tight security for the six years old project.
He said the excavation of historic objects near the mine project site had been stopped and the Ministry of Information and Culture had been informed about the decision.
The district chief said the project of digging historic objects was to be completed by March 2013, but nearly 700 mine workers could not vacate the mine site to allow the digging end fast.
He said many Metallurgical Corporation of China (MCC) workers had already abandoned the project and mine extraction works had been stopped.
Provincial council head, Dr. Abdul Wali Wakil, said security incidents had been behind delays in mine extraction process.
He said the project of excavating artifacts was rife with corruption, adding only 50 workers had been involved in the process instead of hundreds as claimed.
The public representative accused some western countries and the World Bank of creating hurdles to the project’s implementation.
He said World Bank officials once invited area people to the Serena Hotel in Kabul and gave them wrong advises.
However, the governor’s spokesman Din Mohammad Darwesh said some Chinese workers had gone on vacations and there was no problem in extraction works at the Mes Ainak mine.
