Closing arguments were heard April 2 in the defamation case filed by Taseko Mines Ltd. against an environmental group critical of its proposed New Prosperity Mine development.
Taseko is seeking damages from the Western Canada Wilderness Committee (WCWC) over comments the Vancouver-based group made in 2012, while the controversial gold-copper mine project proposed around Fish Lake in the British Columbia Interior was under environmental review.
The company states claims made by the WCWC that the mine would pollute a major river system, turn nearby lakes into toxic tailings ponds, and that the mine proposal itself is crazy, are false and libellous.
The WCWC’s national campaign director, Joe Foy, says Taseko is using the lawsuit to silence free speech. Foy adds he’s proud of the stand the organization has taken, and he’s confident the judge will side with them when a decision is rendered in the coming months.
“This decision will be important because it will shed some light on the limits, if any, of Canadians to speak out on matters of public interest…. This is certainly an important case to the Wilderness Committee and an important case to Taseko. But I think it’s an important case to everyone in society. It bears watching.”
Taseko states the New Prosperity deposit represents a rare economic opportunity for the province, especially the people of the Cariboo-Chilcotin. The project is expected to create some 700 jobs during its two-year construction phase and 550 jobs on the mine site during its 20 years of operation.
Despite twice being turned down by the federal government, the British Columbia Minister of Environment in January granted Taseko Mines a five-year extension of the Environmental Assessment Certificate for the mine, proposed in a remote area deep in the Chilcotin northwest of 100 Mile House.
New Prosperity has supporters in the provincial government and in a number of Cariboo communities. The Tsilhqot’in Nation, which was granted aboriginal title of a huge swath of land near the New Prosperity site in a historic Supreme Court of Canada decision last June, are against Taseko’s plans to develop it.
The federal government twice turned down the project, most recently in 2014, because of its impact on First Nations and environmental risks.
A delegation from the Tsilhqot’in Nation travelled to Vancouver to rally in support of the WCWC on the steps of the BC Supreme Court.
Foy says the WCWC’s work continues in the meantime and the non-profit group is looking forward to its next campaign with the Tsilhqot’in Nation – promoting the creation of a new tribal park, a 300,000 hectare zone around the Taseko lakes intended to protect wilderness and wildlife.
Taseko is also awaiting a decision in its application to seek financial damages from the federal government. The company alleges government officials engaged in misfeasance in public office and acted unlawfully when the project was most recently rejected in February 2014.
