Los Frailes continues to haunt Boliden

Swedish miner Boliden (BLS-T) says it doesn’t expect to suffer any economic damage from the latest claims against it related to the failure of the tailings dam at the Los Frailes mine in Spain in 1998.

Boliden says the local government of Junta de Andalucia is asserting that Boliden is responsible for its cost associated with the failure. Boliden pans to appeal the claims, and notes that a previous attempt to pursue the matter in a civil court was dismissed in October 2003.

A previous criminal investigation and subsequent international commission of inquiry both acquitted Boliden of responsibility for the accident, and instead found that the problem arose from design and construction defects.

Earlier this year, Boliden filed a final claim of 115-million-euro against Spanish-based Dragados y Construcciones.