Tension escalates between Skourletis and Eldorado Gold

Eldorado Gold CEO Paul Wright told reporters the company was suspending its investment program in Skouries due to a series of obstacles that have been thrown up by authorities. “Our investment is treated as a political toy, we never anticipated this,” Wright said. “Failure to receive timely licenses and permits has proved very expensive,” he added.
The suspension of the Skouries plant is expected to lead to 500 job losses over the next three months with another 600 layoffs on the cards if authorities do not issue a permit for the company by the end of March. Wright said other foreign investors would be watching the Greek government’s treatment of Eldorado, adding however that the company had no plans to pull out of Greece.
Instead of trying to find a solution, the Greek government escalates the tension by imposing a fine of 1.7 million euros to Hellas Gold, while European Commission has already sent a message to Athens saying that Greece should attract and keep investments.
The leadership of the Ministry of Environment, Energy and Climate Change, Panos Skourletis and Yannis Tsironis, imposed a fine of 1.7343 million euros to Hellas Gold for 21 violations taking into account the relevant recommendations of the Environmental Inspectorate.
In a statement, the ministry points out that the violations had been checked and ascertained during 2012 -2014 period, but the political leaders and governments of that period preferred to ‘forget’ the existence of the relevant reports at the expense of the Greek residents, the workers and the environment.
“Therefore, the new government had to take specific measures, even though it shouldn’t, for the obvious reasons, so as to confirm the specific violations and impose the applicable fines” says the statement.