Pol Lt-Colonel Prawut Wongseenin, director of the Consumer Protection and Environmental Crime Bureau, said yesterday that the case was now under consideration for approval from the DSI director before starting the investigation. On Tuesday, a group of affected people from the Akara Resources gold-mine operation in Thab Khlo district petitioned the DSI to probe the expansion of the operation near the community, which they say has caused severe environmental and health impacts.

The group also claimed that the gold-mine expansion went ahead before official permission was granted and the mining operation was still ongoing even with the issue still in the appeals court. “We have the information from the earlier inspection of the gold mine, which we will present to the DSI director for acceptance as a special case. In the meantime, there has been no investigation on the case yet,” Prawut said.

Earlier, he accepted the plea from the anti-gold-mine group and said the DSI would look at two issues. The first is an investigation into the mine’s operation and expansion, and the second issue is the health impact.

The head of Akara’s corporate affairs, Cherdsak Utha-aroon, said the company had not yet received any word from the DSI, but was ready to cooperate fully with the investigation. “We haven’t got the case information from the DSI yet, but as I know from the news reports, the accusations against us were the same allegations that the gold-mine opposition group used against us and we can clarify these issues,” Cherdsak said.

He said the company had submitted an Environmental and Health Impact Assessment report on the expansion and followed proper procedures to get permission. It had been officially granted permission in October 2012. On the alleged health impacts on people living near the mine, he said many company employees had been working closely with the operation, yet they had been checked and were still healthy.

Suekanya Teerachartdamrong, a representative of the anti-gold-mine group from Phichit, said she was pleased to hear that the DSI had accepted the petition for a probe into the mining operation.

“We have appealed to the DSI several times since May 2015, when a water-sample test found there was cyanide leakage from the gold mine’s tailing storage system, but there was no answer. However, we are happy that the DSI will investigate on this case,” Suekanya said.

“We would like the DSI to help us and end the people’s prolonged agony. We don’t want to see this effort end up like the earlier decisions, which were just buying more time for the gold mine.” She said the lives of the people residing near the mine was harder during this dry season because they have not yet received drinking water, and their vegetable supply would run out in March.