Brzkov – municipalities and private landowners want to amend the Mining Act of 1988

=> CZECH version of this article '''According to the news from June 2016, municipalities of Brzkov, Polná, Přibyslav and Věžnice exhausted all possiblities in order to stop proceedings for expansion of the protected deposit area (CHLÚ) of Brzkov-Věžnice. In the past, they could not participate in the proceedings for the establishment of CHLÚ, and now they can not participate in the proceedings which are about a fourfold expansion of existing CHLÚ. This is due to a still valid socialist Mining Act of 1988, § 17, para (3), which says that only a proposer can participate in the proceedings, i.e. state enterprise DIAMO.'''

Thus through its common solicitor two villages, two towns and three private land owners have decided to submit an application for taking part in proceedings. They count on the fact that when their request will be dismissed under the Mining Act, they shall first file cassation complaint to the Supreme Administrative Court and afterwards they will file complaint to the Constitutional Court in order to achieve the abolition of a statutory provision which severely curtails the property rights of land owners and is in conflict with constitutional guarantees in the Czech Republic.

Based on their existing behavior, the state enterprise DIAMO might want to argue during the future lawsuits that it is in the public interest to expropriate land owners according to law, and for compensation, in order to obtain strategically important raw materials, and to ensure energy self-sufficiency of the country. However, according to the feasibility study from 2014 uranium mining appears to be uneconomic under current conditions. Also, Calla and Our Future Without Uranium NGOs presented evidence in their joint press release why uranium mining is in the interest of DIAMO and not in the public interest nor in the interest of energy security of the state.

Olga Kališová, Calla (July 17, 2016)