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Rio Tinto: No progress, only hollow talk

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As Rio Tinto prepares for its 9 April Annual General Meeting, campaign groups from five continents have come together to pressure the company to meet its commitments and answer demands from mining-affected communities. Under the title “Rio Tinto: No Progress, only Hollow Talk”, the coalition is taking the mining giant to task over its claims to support ‘human progress’ while its actions devastate communities and environments across the globe.

Map of Rio Tinto mines

By highlighting several sites around the world where Rio Tinto is failing to live up to its own rhetoric, the campaign amplifies the voices of those calling for justice and unites resistance to exploitative extraction. You can find an overview of all the cases here(opens in new window) .

Broken promises

We want to draw attention to four key areas:

  1. erasure of indigenous heritage,
  2. water stress,
  3. environmental harm, and
  4. the looting of natural resources.

In each of these areas, Rio Tinto has made promises it has not kept. Therefore we have formulated a number of demands for Rio Tinto(opens in new window) to address urgently.

Oyu Tolgoi mine

For the Oyu Tolgoi mine in Mongolia, our demands are:

1. Socio-ecological justice:

2. Economic justice

Stop shifting profits to tax havens, and instead ensure that taxes are paid where profits are generated and real economic activity takes place; Provide transparency about all tax related to Oyu Tolgoi, by publishing Oyu Tolgoi LLC’s annual accounts in an unconsolidated manner. This would provide the Mongolian public with more detailed information with regard to Oyu Tolgoi’s contributions to Mongolia’s public revenue; Commit to a joint review and the renegotiation of the Oyu Tolgoi Investment Agreement (OTIA) together with the Government of Mongolia. In line with Rio Tinto’s recent willingness to renegotiate the Oyu Tolgoi Underground Mine Development and Financing Plan

an admission of the need to renegotiate the OTIA could allow Rio and the GoM to reach a fairer division of the mine’s revenues, allowing for economic justice for Mongolia and a more stable relationship between the two parties; Remove the fiscal stabilisation clause and tax holidays, to develop a more constructive and sustainable relationship between Rio Tinto and the Mongolian Government; Include stakeholders less influenced by short-term political interests and more by long-term sustainable development, such as local civil society, affected herder communities, and environmental governance and resource governance experts, to better meet the needs of the Mongolian people and the protection of the Mongolian environment.

3. Abort the UNCITRAL arbitration process

4. Provide transparency about the energy source and energy consumption of the Oyu Tolgoi mine.

What can you do?

Send Rio Tinto a message and tell them what you think!(opens in new window)

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