Argentine court upholds glacier law in mining area

Reuters: Argentina's Supreme Court ruled on Tuesday that key articles of a glacier protection law should apply in a northern province where the world's largest gold miner, Barrick Gold Corp, is building a huge mine high in the Andes.

Tuesday's ruling takes precedence over a 2010 decision by a federal judge in San Juan province who suspended the application of six key articles of the law following a complaint presented by mining industry groups.

"The Supreme Court revokes the precautionary measures that suspended the application of the glacier law in the province of San Juan," the official judicial news agency said.

San Juan province is home to Barrick's Veladero mine, which lies at an altitude of more than 4,000 meters (13,000-feet) not far from the company's huge Pascua Lama project - a roughly $5 billion gold-silver mine set to enter production in 2013...

At the Veladero mine, shot by GRITTA, Antonio, Wikimedia Commons, under the Creative Commons Attribution 3.0 Unported license