Traditional owners given veto over Jabiluka mine

Traditional owners given veto over Jabiluka mine

ABC News Online

February 25, 2005

Energy Resources of Australia (ERA) will sign an agreement today with the traditional owners of the Jabiluka uranium mine site, giving them the power to decide if and when the mine will reopen. The company says the agreement has ruled a line under past conflicts.

In 2003, ERA filled in the Jabiluka site in the Kakadu National Park and promised it would not mine there without Aboriginal consent.

ERA's Harry Kenyon-Slaney says today's agreement will give the Mirarr people the power to decide if and when the mine will re-open. "We've made no secret of the fact that in the longer-term we would like to develop the project of Jabiluka. "But this agreement provides the traditional owners the right to agree or not to agree to that project and I think that's right."