(translated into English by translate.google.com)

"Before you start building must meet requirements which consist of a series of approvals, and are pending in the General Directorate of Water," the minister Ana Uriarte, head of the environment, in a meeting with foreign correspondents .
SANTIAGO, May 14. The Chilean Environment Minister Ana Lya Uriarte said today that Canada's Barrick Gold, the project leader of the Chilean mine Pascua Lama argentina, must request authorization from the Directorate General of Water prior to construction of it.

Uriarte's words come a week after Barrick Gold announced that the start of construction of the mine, the cost will amount to between 2,800 and 3,000 million (2,088 million euros and 2238).

Uriarte said that the mine will produce between 750,000 and 800,000 ounces of gold and 35 million ounces of silver a year, in 2006 adopted the resolution of environmental qualification required by the authorities to implement the project.

However, it has a slope of the various authorizations and requirements that are part of the resolution of environmental qualification.

The Pascua Lama project, located more than 5000 meters above sea level on the border between Chile and Argentina, has been opposed by several environmental groups from Chile, who argue that the supposed depredations of scarce water resources of the area .

Uriarte denied this and said that the Chilean Executive has a special emphasis on environmental preservation, as the bill provides for the creation of a Ministry of the Environment, an environmental impact assessment and supervision of environmental monitoring.

This measure was passed by Congress and now must be processed in the Senate, the Chilean government aims to strengthen environmental protection in large projects like Pascua Lama or hydroelectric HidroAys�n of which will be built south of the country.

"The challenge facing Chile for the projects of the magnitude of Pascua Lama and others is to have an integrated monitoring system, which has modern, integrated ecological platforms that allow to control quality," he said.

It emphasized that the glaciers in the area where they built the mine "will not be intercepted, removed or destroyed."

"The only reason that would justify its intervention would be a matter of national interest, as the supply of water for the population," he said.