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LONDON (Alliance News) - Aura Energy Ltd said Monday it had signed a farm-in agreement with Nomads Mining Co Sarl which allows Aura to earn a 70% interest in a gold exploration project in Mauritania.
Aura signed the deal with Nomad which wholly-owns the exploration permit at the 160 square kilometre site which contains 50 square kilometres of Archean greenstones in the Tasiast greenstone belt.
As part of the deal, Aura will pay an initial USD100,000 with at least a further USD100,000 to be invested in the project. Aura will then be able to earn a 70% interest by spending USD1 million over a three-year period, once it does it will solely fund the decision to mine.
Should Aura define 1.0 million ounces of resource then it will pay USD1.5 million to Nomads.
"We are delighted with this strategic addition to our project area in the Tasiast gold district," Aura Executive Chair Peter Reeve said. "It is unusual today to be able to obtain access to virtually unexplored greenstone belts in established gold bearing provinces such as this. We are excited at the potential given the 20 million ounce Tasiast Gold deposit is the only known significant gold resource in a field where little exploration has been conducted and in a geological setting where gold deposits tend to occur in clusters elsewhere in the word."
"We will maintain our core focus in Mauritania of getting the Tiris Uranium Project DFS completed and the project into production as soon as possible," Reeve added. "However, given our extensive knowledge of Mauritania and our planned activities in adjoining areas this presents another high-quality opportunity in a country we know well. It is an excellent opportunity, in our opinion, to add significant shareholder value for Aura Energy."
Shares in Aura were untraded at 0.56 pence on Monday.