Aurelian to list on TSX, updates Ecuador progress (March 05, 2007)

Vancouver — Aurelian Resources (ARU-V, AUREF-O) has received conditional approval to list its shares on the Toronto Stock Exchange, a milestone that the company hopes will provide it with greater access to capital and broader market recognition.

However, before its shares are listed for trading on the TSX, the company said it must satisfy certain conditions set by the exchange prior to May 17. It did not elaborate.

Aurelian is currently exploring in southeastern Ecuador, one of the Latin American countries that has switched to the political left following the recent election of a new president, 43-year-old economist Rafael Correra.

During the campaign, Correra called on Ecuador to cut its ties with the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. He said he wants to hold a referendum to rewrite the constitution to reduce the power of traditional parties and limit U.S. military activities in Ecuador.

That kind of rhetoric has persuaded some mining companies to scale back the scope of their activities while they assess the political situation and what it might mean for exploration in future.

However, Ecuador’s delivery of a scheduled US$135-million interest payment on its Global 2030 bonds is a “positive step,” said Aurelian CEO Patrick Anderson.

“This is in line with previous statements by the government recognizing the need for continued foreign investment in the country and recent comments by Gustavo Larrea, a minister of government, that in Ecuador, the state will regulate the economy, but is not proposing a state-run economy,” Anderson said. “Overall, we have seen encouraging willingness on the part of both the national and local governments to engage in dialogue in order to ensure that the developing mining industry in Ecuador provides benefits to all stakeholders.”

Anderson’s comments were contained in a press release issued on Feb. 21, when Aurelian shares rose 90 to $29.50 on the TSX Venture Exchange, to trade in a 52-week range of 61-$43.

About a year ago, the company announced the discovery of the Fruta Del Norte (FDN) zone at its wholly owned Condor gold-silver project — which is located along the Peruvian border — after issuing results of four drill holes. One of them returned a 237-metre-long intercept averaging 4.14 grams (or 2.89 grams cut) gold and 8.5 grams silver per tonne.

Aurelian has described FDN as an “intermediate-sulphidation” epithermal gold-silver system, and said work is continuing with five drill rigs operating on the deposit.

The company also said infrastructure at the Condor site continues to improve to facilitate the increased volume of drilling. It hopes to soon deploy smaller, hand-portable drill rigs on other targets including El Tigre, which is located to the southeast of FDN and was discovered in 2004 through a stream-sediment sampling program.

Aurelian said it hopes to be drilling at least one of these other prospects by the end of the first quarter.