Guinea: at least two dead in Kouroussa in clashes between gold miners and law enforcement
Location of Kouroussa, 500 kilometers from Conakry.
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At least two people, two young men aged 20 and 23, were killed and public and private property destroyed in Kouroussa, 500 km from the capital Conakry, in eastern Guinea, during clashes between artisanal miners and the police, Saturday April 17.
These clashes erupted during protests by Guinean gold miners accusing the Guinean authorities of having dispossessed them of an artisanal mine for the benefit of Burkinabè operators.
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With our correspondent in Conakry,
Moktar Bah
A statement from the elders of the city broadcast on a rural radio station prohibiting the gold miners of Kouroussa from accessing a gold mine is said to be at the origin of this violence.
This press release asked the citizens of Kouroussa to stop all gold mining activity on this site, which now belongs to the Kouroussa Gold Mining company.
The message specified that "
any offender would respond alone for his reluctance and hostility
."
Feeling betrayed by their representatives, the artisanal miners barricaded the city center, burned tires and charred vehicles.
They also vandalized the residences of the city's prefect and mayor and drove out local administrators.
The demonstrators especially denounced the exploitation of mining sites, their only source of income, by Burkinabe nationals under the guise of Kouroussa Gold Mining.
Emissaries of the head of state, including the governor of Upper Guinea, Sadou Kéita, went to Kouroussa to restore calm in the city.
This Sunday, April 18, it is a precarious calm that reigned in the locality according to several sources.
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