Open pit disasters in Mexico and Peru

Mariana Rangel is filled with nostalgia as she gazes at the abandoned installations of the Dos Estrellas mine, where she worked as a secretary for six years. "Those were years of prosperity; this is all there is left," she tells IPS, pointing to what used to be the local hospital. The old mining town of Tlalpujahua, a picturesque colonial hill town 160 km from the Mexican capital, is a symbol of the illusory wealth and very real damages of mining in this country. Between 1905 and 1913 it was one of the world's biggest producers of gold, but the mine was closed down by the government in 1959 on the grounds that it was unprofitable. In one eight-year period, 45,000 kg of gold and 400,000 kg of silver were extracted from the mine, owned at the time by wealthy Belgian adventurer François Joseph Fournier, using the most advanced techniques of the time. A century after the heyday of this town of 8,000 people, open pit mining is at the centre of heated controversy, due to the meager benefits it brings local communities, and even governments, which are left to deal with the mines' legacy of pollution.