YAOUNDE, Cameroon -(Dow Jones)- The new acting chairman of Sundance Resources Ltd. (SDL.AU), George Jones, began meeting with top Cameroon government officials to finalize negotiations that could authorize the company to start extracting iron from its eastern Cameroon site of Mbalam.
Jones, who arrived in Cameroon this week, returned to the company as chairman after the Australian corporation's board of directors were killed last June, when their chartered CASA C-212 twin turboprop plane crashed in Congo-Brazzaville.
"We're here in Cameroon talking with the minister [of industries, mines and technological development] and other departments about all our issues. We're reassuring them that we're still proceeding with our timetable," the Sundance Resources executive told reporters Friday after meeting the Cameroonian minister. Jones' team had earlier held talks with Cameroon's Premier Philemon Yang on Thursday.
"We believe that this timetable can still be achieved," Jones said, adding that, "Our mission over the next three months will be to complete our negotiations with the government."
The company's chairman, Geoff Wedlock, its chief executive, Don Lewis, company secretary John Carr-Gregg and three other directors, including Australian magnate Ken Talbot had come to Cameroon to secure authorization to start extracting the Mbalam iron ore.
Sundance has a 90% stake in Cameroon Iron Ore Co., or Camiron SA, which owns 1,800 square kilometers of fields with estimated reserves of 2.2 million tons of combined inferred mineral resource of enriched itabirite and direct-shipping-quality hematite.
The project costs USD3.4 billion and is expected to last for 25 years.
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