Bank of China (Panama Branch) provides $200 million loan for Mirador Copper Mine Project

Project narrative

On June 22, 2020, the Panama Branch of Bank of China issued a $200 million loan to Ecuacorriente S.A.（厄瓜多尔科里安特公司 or ECSA) -- a special purpose vehicle and joint venture of China Railway Construction Corporation (CRCC) and Tongling Nonferrous Metals Group -- for the Mirador Copper Mine Project. The loan carried a 5-year maturity (final maturity date: July 9, 2025). CRCC issued a corporate repayment guarantee in support of the loan. The purpose of the project was to develop Mirador copper mine, which is located along the valley of the Rio Zamora in Zamora-Chinchipe Province. Its exact locational coordinates are 03°34'N latitude and 78°26'W. In 2020, Ecuador's General Comptroller conducted a special examination of the project, which concluded that irregularities occurred between July 2013 and September 2019. The General Comptroller report claims that, between 2009 and 2016, the mining activities of Ecuacorriente S.A. affected the Wawayme, Tundayme, and Quimi rivers by exposing them to metals and minerals. During the same period, Ecuador's Ministry of the Environment requested a new study from Ecuacorriente S.A., which was delivered in October 2018 and confirmed the high concentrations of metals in the three rivers. The General Comptroller also detected a lack of control by the Ministry of the Environment, since between 2016 and 2019 the Ministry did not require the company to take ‘corrective actions’, thus putting local communities that use the river at risk. Also, the General Comptroller’s report determined that the environmental monitoring and audits carried out between 2015 and 2017 by Ecuacorriente S.A. regarding the exploitation and benefit phases of the project were conducted without authorization from the Ministry of the Environment. This lack of oversight meant that, until the closing of the special examination in September 2019, the environmental performance of the Mirador project was unknown and measures aimed at environmental repair, restoration, and remediation were not applied. Ecuacorriente also received funding for the Mirador Copper Mine in 2014 from a syndicate of Chinese state-owned banks (see Parent ID#2346).