Mine Owner Sues for Slander from Topixhttps://www.topix.net/world/costa-rica/2011/11/mine-owner-sues-for-slanderMine Owner Sues for Slander Wednesday, 30 November 2011 01:49 Last Updated on Tuesday, 29 November 2011 15:01 Written by Rod HughesAt least five persons, including two university professors, two lawmakers and an environmental lawyer, have been sued for slander by Industrias Infinito, owner of the controversial La Crucitas open pit gold mine in San Carlos canton.The two university professors, Nicholas Boeglin, an international law expert, and Jorge Lobo, a biologist, are being sued for alleged slanderous statements they made in a documentary film treating the controversy of open pit mining that has swirled around the country for a decade.Pablo Ortega, the film's producer, told the newspaper La Nacion that the company is demanding 500 million colones damages against each of the professors. The documentary was entitled, "El Oro de los Tontos" (Fool's Gold) and produced last June by the University of Costa Rica School of Biology.Also being sued, reported the newspaper, are Citizen Action Party (PAC) deputies Claudio Monge and Manrique Oviedo and environmental lawyer Edgardo Araya.Update: Interviewed by the English-language weekly The Tico Times after acourt hearing, Araya, a vigorous foe of the mine, told a reporter that his legal team and the mine's team met to talk of a settlement but were unable to agree on terms. He accused the mine owners of attempting to silence opposition with fear.Lobo was obviously unrepentant when he told the La Nacion, "In one of them (statements in the film) I mentioned the existence of accidents at the rewashing lagoons that produced contamination from cyanide-laced water. They say this is slander because I'll talking ill of the company." He is connected with the National Museum of Natural Sciences.Another cause mentioned in the suit, Lobo told a reporter, was sparked when he implied in the documentary that the permit to mine may have been obtained through slanting of information in the application and by "buying the good will" of government officials.The Las Crucitas gold mine is owned by Industrias Infinito Costa Rica, a wholly-owned subsidiary of a Calgary, Canada, firm. which has a pending appeal in Costa Rica against the annulment of its concession. (See previous articles.)If the appeal prospers, it would annul not only the suspension of its concession but also the environmental impact studies of 2005 and 2008. Former President Abel Pacheco (2002-06) placed an embargo on open pit mining that was ignored by his successor, Oscar Arias (2006-10).Arias declared the mine "in the national interest," thus giving the go ahead for mine development. This development was brought to a screeching halt later and the ban on such mines reinstated. A Legislative Assembly investigating committee called Arias to testify about his granting the concession after he left office last spring.Even then, controversy continued around the mine when a substitute judge, Moise Fachler, resigned after a formal accusation that he had leaked the preliminary draft of an appeals court decision to company officials.