Police target Barrack Gold Mine protester

BY JEREMY BROWN
A Cyanide Watch organiser arrested on his way to a protest outside the Barrack Gold Mine at Lake Cowal said police were more interested in protecting the mine than in the right of people to protest peacefully. ‘Police are not impartial when it comes to Barrack’s mine,’ Graeme Dunstan said. ‘They are using this as a form of harassment to prevent my democratic right to oppose the mine in Lake Cowal.’
Police stopped Dunstan on Easter Saturday and forced him to leave his car by the side of the road 30 km from West Wyalong. He was taken to the local police station and then driven to Griffith Jail, 150 km away. He was released the next morning.
Dunstan said police had produced a warrant issued at last year’s Easter protest. ‘I had applied for an adjournment and it should have been followed through,’ he said. ‘I received no notification that a warrant for my arrest was in force. Police pushed to get a warrant and arrested me as I made my way to the protest camp.’
Cyanide Watch campaigns against the use of cyanide, a highly toxic chemical, in the gold mining industry. The Barrack Mine uses huge quantities every day to leach gold from the ore. A significant byproduct is arsenic. Every week, up to 200 tonnes of cyanide are transported by rail from the Orica Plant in Gladstone Queensland to Sydney, then 350 km to West Wyalong.