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Gold/Mining/Energy : Royal Oak-RYO -- Ignore unavailable to you. Want to Upgrade?

To: Peter Neidhardt who wrote (1136)	8/2/1998 7:22:00 PM
From: Michael Bidder	Read Replies (2) \| Respond to of 1706

Peter NO NO NO !!! You are mistaken. You said: <<<..longs should not even bother selling>>> The market cap of Royal Oak is still $88 million US dollars. Pegasus's market cap at this point was between $20 and $40 million US dollars. That means that Royal will fall to Bid 1/4 ask 5/16 at a minimum before the Bankruptcy announcement. To hold your loss risks 100% Percent of your capital! Cut your losses. DO not listen to those who guided you to by the stock. I have been advising a sell since Nov. 97 at $2.00! Those who council you not to sell are themselves selling. Be careful Peter you may lose all your remaining money. Michael Bidder

To: Peter Neidhardt who wrote (1136)	8/3/1998 11:47:00 AM
From: Mr Metals	Respond to of 1706

B.C., Royal Oak make legal gaffe on gold mine OTTAWA (CP) - One of the first things taught at law school is make sure the legal title is clear on any real-estate transaction. But that didn't happen with Canada's newest big gold and copper project, the Kemess Mine in remote north-central British Columbia. Royal Oak Mines spent $680 million buying the claims and building a mammoth open-pit mine. The NDP government in British Columbia added $166 million in cash and concessions. But a battery of legal advisers on both sides failed to clear legal title. It could cost B.C. taxpayers, or Royal Oak, a bundle. The Kemess site has been the subject of a formal aboriginal land claim since 1987. That claim was buttressed last December by the Supreme Court of Canada's land-mark Delgamuukw ruling that effectively protects native ownership rights over lands never ceded by treaties. Premier Glen Clark's government and Royal Oak were both warned by the native bands affected by the Kemess development that neither of them should develop the site until the 14-year-old Delgamuukw case was settled. In a confidential June 1997 agreement signed by the B.C. government and Royal Oak, the company acknowledges that unsettled land claims are a risk: "Royal Oak has no knowledge of any fact that might reasonably be expected to materially adversely affect their properties, assets, condition (financial or otherwise) business or property, or their ability to fulfill their obligations under this agreement, other than any native land claims respecting the Kemess Property." The same agreement, which cemented a deal to trade Royal Oak claims at Windy Craggy, which is now a protected wilderness park in northwest British Columbia, for those at Kemess, promised the B.C. attorney general would provide Royal Oak with a legal opinion guaranteeing the provincial government "has the power and capacity to enter into this agreement." Royal Oak told the Citizen in a written statement last week that no legal opinions were ever provided by the B.C. government. The company didn't bother to seek out its own opinion, either. "No legal advice was obtained," wrote Graham Eacott, vice-president of investor relations for Royal Oak. Compounding Royal Oak's legal problems is a lawsuit filed by mining giant Falconbridge scheduled to be heard by the Supreme Court of British Columbia in September. Falconbridge was a co-developer at Windy Craggy and claims to hold the legal title. In a case slated to be heard by the Supreme Court of British Columbia in September, Falconbridge alleges Royal Oak and the Clark government conspired to defraud it of rightful compensation for its investment at Windy Craggy. Royal Oak is also facing trouble on two other legal fronts: a recent Federal Court of Canada decision requiring complete, cumulative impact assessments before major resource projects are approved; and a lawsuit by the Tsay Keh Dene native band alleging B.C.'s approval of the Kemess project violated provincial environmental assessment legislation. Royal Oak has denied legal liability in all these cases. The most pressing - and potentially damaging - legal issue is the formal land claim on Kemess by the 300-member Tsay Key Dene band. With Kemess now operating, Royal Oak and the B.C. government may be forced to cut a deal with the band to preclude a potentially disastrous court rulings. But when the Citizen asked Royal Oak president Peggy Witte if the band has a legitimate claim to Kemess, she said: "No, I don't. We're mining at Kemess. We've taken the land to lease. We pay a mining royalty and taxes to the B.C. government. If the land belongs to the natives, then we'd be happy to pay the royalty and mining taxes to them. Just tell us who the land belongs to, and we'll pay the right party. "The shareholders put up their money, and our high-yield bondholders put up their money, on the basis of the approvals we got from the B.C. government. So if for some reason we're not allowed to run it, we would have a humongous claim against the B.C. government." Witte said Royal Oak is helping native groups by giving them $14 million worth of work in the last two years. "I would rather do what I think is right for the surrounding area: offering the jobs and business opportunities so they can reap the benefits of the mine also." The Kemess mine permanently employs seven native workers, drawn from across Western and Northern Canada, of total workforce of 324. Royal Oak did invite the Tsay Keh Dene and neighboring Takla Lake bands to bid on several subcontracts for the project, with no guarantee of success against non-native competitors. When the native bands threatened to ask for an injunction to stop Kemess construction, Royal Oak threatened to withdraw even these tenuous benefits. The ultimatum worked. The bands backed off. In exchange for withdrawing legal challenges, the Tsay Keh Dene had asked Royal Oak to, among other things, recognize aboriginal land rights and design Kemess as equal partners; ensure permanent employment and contracting for natives; commit $1 million in seed money to an area development fund to be followed by $500,000 per year, while the band matched those funds on a 1:4 ratio; and pay the band a one-per-cent net royalty on revenues from the mine. Those terms were more modest than recent deals signed between natives and mining companies in the Northwest Territories. They are also comparable to terms negotiated by Canadian municipalities affected by major projects. Yet the band received no revenue or royalties, no training or job guarantees and no binding environmental protection plan. Now, armed with the definitive Supreme Court ruling on Delgamuukw, and the Federal Court of Canada ruling that major resource projects can't be approved without complete, cumulative environmental impact assessments, the Tsay Keh Dene may have some powerful legal leverage over Royal Oak. They already have a highly respected lawyer in Peter Freeman, who helped prosecute former B.C. premier Bill Vander Zalm on conflict-of-interest charges. His Victoria law firm, Cook Roberts, has taken on the Tsay Keh Dene case for nominal fees. c The Canadian Press, 1998 Mr Metals