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Gold/Mining/Energy : VOISEY BAY'S FIND - A NEW DISCOVERY -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Supervalue who wrote (474)	10/31/1997 12:05:00 PM
From: Kent C.	Respond to of 481

From the Calgary Herald: Thursday 30 October 1997 Tentative deal boosts Voisey's development JACK AUBRY OTTAWA - Newfoundland's huge Voisey's Bay nickel development was given a critical boost Thursday with the announcement of a tentative land-claims deal with the Inuit. The deal, which has been initialed by negotiators with the Inuit and federal and provincial governments, is believed to include self-government rights, compensation of about $200 million, surface rights to resources and control of thousands of square kilometres for the 5,000 Inuit on the Labrador coast. The deal clears the way for negotiations between Inco Ltd. and the Inuit on industrial benefits from the project. The mine in Labrador and a planned smelter in Argentia, Nfld., will create thousands of badly needed jobs for the province while generating billions of dollars in revenues in the weakest provincial economy in the country. Part of the tentative deal, which has been reviewed favorably by the federal and Newfoundland cabinets in the past two days, is a royalty-sharing arrangement with the province. But the Newfoundland government is still looking for a break on losing part of its federal equalization payments calculated before the royalties are paid to the Inuit. A similar land claim agreement has yet to be worked out with the Innu - the 1,500 Indians in the region - but leader Katie Rich said she is encouraged by news of the deal. She expects to use it as a model in upcoming talks - "we've always expected to get whatever the Inuit get." At a press conference in St. John's, Newfoundland Premier Brian Tobin categorized the tentative deal as "equal to or better than any other land claim in place in Canada." "It just clears the air. You now have a fairly clear agreement where we know exactly the participation of the federal and provincial government and the broad sweep of rights of the Labrador Inuit people to land, to resources and to revenues," Tobin said. The exact details of the deal will not be released until Wednesday after the 21-member board of the Labrador Inuit Association meets to review the agreement in the tiny Atlantic town of Nain, Nfld. The deal was struck Tuesday in Ottawa after an eight-day marathon of moving negotiations in various hotel and government boardrooms. Tobin said the threat of a costly, protracted court battle with the Inuit and Innu seemed to focus negotiations in the past two weeks. He called for the "fast-tracking" of the Innu talks even though he noted that the Inuit were negotiating the "primary" land claim in the region. William Barbour, president of the Inuit association, said the deal must be translated into Inuktitut over the weekend for the board members to consider. He is optimistic the offer will be accepted. "This latest achievement increases our confidence that the next steps of reaching . . . an Inuit impact and benefit agreement with Inco and Voisey's Bay Nickel Company are better than they have ever been," Barbour said. A spokesperson for Indian Affairs Minister Jane Stewart said "a lot of hard work is still ahead of us but the federal government is comfortable" with the deal so far. Tobin, who flew to Ottawa last week to monitor discussions, said an agreement-in-principle should be worked out by mid-December and cautioned reporters that several more years of legal refinement of the deal would be required. cheers, Kent