Ovoca Bio Regulatory News (OVB)

23 May 2006 10:27

Ovoca Gold PLC23 May 2006 Ovoca Gold plc ("Ovoca" or the "Company") Expansion of Russian Licence Area and Commencement of 2006 Drilling Programmes Ovoca Gold Plc (AIM: OVG; IEX: OVX) is pleased to announce that • Ovoca has acquired an additional 250 km2 of exploration territorythrough the formation of a new joint venture company "Lovozero Mining Company"which holds the Porosozero Exploration License. Ovoca's total exploration landunder licence in northwest Russia now totals 669 km2. • 2006 Drilling programmes have commenced on the Kolmozero-VoronyaLicense and the Klippen Property in northern Sweden. New Joint Venture Announcement: Porosozero Exploration License Ovoca is pleased to announce that it has formed a Russian registered jointventure company "Lovozero Mining Company" with its partner, the Central KolaExpedition, with each party holding a 50% equity interest. Ovoca has the rightto acquire the Central Kola Expedition's equity, at par value, in the jointventure at a date of Ovoca's choosing following the transfer of the PorosozeroExploration License, previously held by the Central Kola Expedition, into thename of the above joint venture company. The license covers an area of 250 km2and is situated to the east of the three licenses held by Ovoca's subsidiary,Black Fox Resources, within the highly prospective Kolmozero-Voronya Greenstonebelt. This Exploration license has now been successfully transferred to the LovozeroMining Company and the joint venture company, in becoming the new registeredowner of the license, accepts all the liabilities in terms of work commitmentsfor the life of the license. The license is valid until 2009 with rights forextension subject to fulfilment of the conditions of the license agreement. Inaddition Ovoca has agreed to reimburse the Central Kola Expedition forexploration works completed to date on the above license amounting to US$80,000. The joint venture agreement was drafted with the assistance of Padva andPartners, attorneys at Law, of Moscow. Exploration on Porosozero conducted by the Central Kola Expedition during 2005,in the form of deep overburden till sampling, has defined: • an extensive anomalous zone of gold over 3 kilometres in length withwidths averaging 150 metres and anomalous gold values of from 20 parts perbillion to 1,180 parts per billion (1.2 grammes per tonne); • similar geochemical anomalies found in the area of theKolmozero-Voronya license were found to define high-grade deposits such asOleninskoye and South Leshaya; and • the extensive gold anomaly is the highest so far defined by deepgeochemical sampling conducted by he Central Kola Expedition within theKolmozero-Voronya Greenstone belt. Ovoca now holds almost all of the highly prospective ground in this belt,hosting gold, a copper-molybdenum porphyry and rare metal deposits, along withintersected platinum group metal and copper-nickel mineralisation and potentialfor copper-nickel deposits. The total area covered by Ovoca licenses, innorthwest Russia, amount to 669 km2 in total area and is broken down by licensein the following table: License Area km2Kolmozero-Voronya (Black Fox Resources) 150Kolmozero-Voronya SW (Black Fox Resources) 117Kontozero (Black Fox Resources) 152Porosozero (Lovozero Mining Company) 250Total 669 Kola Peninsula, Russia - Exploration Activities Ovoca has commenced its 2006 drilling programme on the Kolmozero-Voronyaproperty in the Kola Peninsula in northwest Russia. The programme willinitially involve infill drilling to further delimit and upgrade the resourcesof the orebodies of the Oleninskoye and South Leshaya deposits and the Pellapahkcopper-molybdenum-gold porphyry deposit. An initial 5,000 metres of drillinghas been outlined with additional drilling to be based on the results fromsurface trenching. The Pellapahk copper-molybdenum-gold porphyry deposit has historical resourceestimates of: • 298 million tonnes of ore, P1 category according to the Russian andCIS resource classification system, with average grades of 0.06% molybdenum and0.25% copper reported by the Central Kola Expedition in 1985; • the high-grade gold veins of the adjacent Oleninskoye deposit areknown, from historical drilling, to extend into the Pellapahk deposit whichshould add a considerable gold credit to the value of the deposit; • re-assays of reject samples from historical drilling indicate thatgrades previously reported and analysed by qualitative spectral methods may bean understatement of the true grade when compared to assay results fromconventional quantitative analytical techniques; and • to the north of Pellapahk at Leshaya North there is potential for asimilar sized porphyry deposit which has yet to be explored, defined by asimilar geochemical anomaly for molybdenum and copper which originally resultedin the discovery of the Pellapahk deposit. New Licenses in the Kolmozero-Voronya Greenstone Belt The acquisition of two additional exploration licenses, announced on the 10November 2005, within the Kolmozero-Voronya Greenstone Belt (Kolmozero-VoronyaSouthwest and Kontozero) by ZAO Black Fox Resources has considerably enhancedOvoca's land holding position on the highly prospective precious and base metalKolmozero-Voronya Greenstone belt. The Kolmozero-Voronya license provideadditional prospects including Verkhny Nyalm, a potential medium-grade-high-tonnage deposit with associated palladium and platinum potential and theeastern extension of the Meshen deposit. The Kontozero area includes anextensive gold geochemical anomaly with grades of 0.2g/t over an area of 1 km2.The extensive gold geochemical anomaly with geology and structure analogous withCripple Creek (Colorado, USA) and Ladolan (Papua-New Guinea) make the Kontozerocaldera a highly prospective structure for significant gold mineralisation. The2006 exploration programme will include surface prospecting, deep overburdensampling and trenching to define underlying gold mineralisation which will befollowed up by core drilling. Sweden - Exploration Activities At the prospective Klippen project in northern Sweden, Ovoca has commenced adrilling programme to further explore the strike length and continuity of twobroad areas of medium-grade gold mineralisation. Assay results report a gradeof 9.78g/t over an intersection of 1.0 metre at a depth of 7.0 to 8.0 metresfrom surface within a zone of mineralisation previously outlined by trenching.These areas have previously been defined by limited drilling and trenching whichhad: • intersected broad mineralised zones of: 20 metres at 2.4 grammes pertonne average grade in a surface trench; • 24.1 metres at an average grade of 1.72 grammes per tonne whichincluded an intersection of 5.7 metres at 3.3 grammes per tonne and 1.0m at 7.8grammes per tonne extending within two zones also within a surface trench; • strike length of the two zones is over 450 metres; and • trench sampling also reported an intersection with an average grade ofcopper mineralisation of greater than 1.0% copper over 8.0 metres; Further assays on 2006 Russian and Swedish exploration activities are expectedover the coming weeks. Technical Glossary: Copper-molybdenum porphyry Low grade high tonnage deposit associated with an altered intrusive body as found at Bethlehem, Canada and El Teniente, Chile; Deep overburden till sampling Exploration technique to drill through glacial deposits to sample the base of the deposit overlying the bedrock; Mineralisation In the above context refers to the presence minerals containing precious and base metals of economic interest; Russian Resource Classification Based on the Soviet classification system with P1 category considered equivalent to JORC inferred; and Spectral analysis A comparative qualitative analytical technique used to estimate mineral content; The above information has been reviewed and verified by Mr. Roger Turner,Director and Chairman of Ovoca, for the purposes of the Guidance Note forMining, Oil and Gas Companies issued by the London Stock Exchange in March 2006. Mr. Turner, with 40 years of mining engineering, management and consultingexperience, graduated as a mining engineer from the Camborne School of Mines,has an MSc degree in Economic Geology from Leicester University and is a memberin good standing with the Institute of Mining and Metallurgy and a UK CharteredEngineer. Ovoca Resources Plc is an international exploration company with dual listing in London (OVG.L) and Ireland (OVX.IR), exploring for Precious and base metals in Russia, Sweden and Ireland For further information please visit www.ovocagold.com or contact: Dr Barrie Oakes, CEO - Ovoca Gold Plc Roger Turner, Chairman - Ovoca Gold Plc Tel: +44 (0)207 397 8151 Tel: +44 (0)207 397 8151 Email: barrie.oakes@ovocagold.com Email: roger.turner@ovocagold.com Mr John Frain - Davy Richard Chase- Ambrian (AIM Broker) Tel: +353 (0)1 679 6363 +44 (0)207 776 6461 Email: emma.priestely@ambrian.com Nick Bias / Alex Buck - Buck Bias (UK PR) Tom McCormack - Connexions PR (Irish PR) Tel: +44 (0)7887 920 530 / +44 (0)7932 740 452 Tel: +353 (0)1 230 3015 Email: nick@buckbias.com / alex@buckbias.com Email: tom.mcc@indigo.ie This information is provided by RNS The company news service from the London Stock Exchange