Mining protesters warned

Five members of last Saturday’s protest against gold mining in the Karangahake Gorge area have been issued with precharge warnings and released.

Holly Dove, of the Protect Karangahake group, said the protesters had removed their tents and ended their demonstration under orders from the police. One of the five, speaking in a video filmed in the back of a police car and broadcast by the group, said they were being taken to Paeroa.

Holly told the NZ Herald the remaining protesters had switched tactics and were gathering people’s signatures in the gorge area for an antimining petition. The group said earlier in a statement that 12 members opposed to gold mining on Department of Conservation land in the Karangahake area took over a mining site that DOC had closed to the public last year for the company New Talisman Gold Mines.

Former Green Party MP Catherine Delahunty was among the 12 who set up camp near the mouth of an old mine shaft in the vicinity of prospecting activities by the company.

“We are here today to make a stand for the conservation estate and to protect our wild and precious places,” said protester and Karangahake resident Lucy Aitken-Read.

Holly said the company’s prospecting area was near the Dubbo Track. The group wants a halt to mining activities in the Karangahake conservation estate. The locally-based action group’s protest was on a portion of public road closed by DOC to allow vehicles to access the company’s site.

“We want the Ministers for Environment and Conservation to honour their pre-election pledges that would see this land protected under schedule 4,” Lucy Aitken-Read said.