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7News has come across a very strange press release on the internet which posted on Monday of this week. A Canadian Company, Erin Ventures Inc., which is based in Victoria British Colombia, announced that it has reclaimed its interest in the Ceibo Chico area of the Chiquibul.

If that name sounds familiar, it should; it made the news several times last year as the location where the Friends for Conservation and Development busted illegal gold panners.

Well, the release from this company claims that it has licenses it obtained for this “gold interest”. It state’s that for this Ceibo Chico interest, the property it has rights to has quote, “3 contiguous Exclusive Prospecting Licenses covering approximately 34 square kilometers (13 square miles), and a 160.25 hectare (396 acre) Mining License, in west/central Belize.” End quote

We’ve been trying to find out what this company and this gold interest is all about, but we’ve not been getting responses from the official government sources.

Today, we reached Rafael Manzanero, Executive Director of the FCD, and he told us via email, he does have brief facts about the company, which he has come across while in his official capacity. He says that an EIA was conducted when the company first emerged, and he did register his concerns about granting them access when the Government entities was in the consulting phase of the project.

Manzanero ended  by saying that this area that Erin Ventures has licenses over is the extreme south of the Chiquibul National Park, where none of the Government Departments actually monitor, which is an issue since there is no oversight mechanism for this private interest.