Authorities in Mali have issued an arrest warrant for Barrick Gold Corp. ABX-T chief executive officer Mark Bristow in a fresh escalation of a tax dispute in the West African country, Malian journalists have reported.
Copies of the arrest warrant, posted by one of the journalists on social media Thursday, show that Mr. Bristow is being charged with money laundering and violating Mali’s financial regulations during the period from 2019 to 2023.
The journalist, Serge Daniel, also posted a copy of an arrest warrant for Abbas Coulibaly, the chief executive officer of Barrick’s Loulo-Gounkoto gold mines in Mali, which accuses him of the same financial crimes. Both warrants are dated Dec. 2 and were issued by a judge in the capital, Bamako.
Authorities in Mali have issued an arrest warrant for Barrick Gold CEO Mark Bristow as a tax dispute in the West African country escalates. A spokesperson for Barrick declined to comment.Melissa Tait/The Globe and Mail
The Reuters news agency, in a separate report, said Mali had issued arrest warrants for Mr. Bristow and Mr. Coulibaly.
“We will not be commenting,” Barrick spokesperson Kathy du Plessis told The Globe and Mail in response to e-mailed questions Thursday.
Mr. Bristow disclosed on Nov. 26 that Malian authorities had arrested four of Barrick’s local employees as part of the same dispute. He said they were “unjustly imprisoned” and that the company was seeking their release and the resolution of all claims against it.
Since then, there has been no indication that the four employees have been released from prison. Asked whether they were still in detention, Ms. du Plessis declined to comment.
Mali’s military regime, which took power in a 2021 coup, has been strong-arming foreign mining companies for a bigger share of their revenues. It has been seeking US$417-million from Barrick, alleging the company failed to pay all its taxes – a charge the company rejects.
John Ing, a veteran gold analyst with Maison Placements in Toronto, said the arrest warrant for Mr. Bristow appears to be a negotiating tactic to exact a better deal from Barrick.
It is unclear how Mali could enforce an arrest warrant for Mr. Bristow. He has often travelled to the country to negotiate face-to-face with top government leaders.
But while there’s an outstanding warrant for his arrest, the company will have to be very careful about who it might send to Mali to negotiate with the junta, Mr. Ing said.
“Obviously, Mr. Bristow is not going to go to Mali,” he said. “And sending a negotiator, I don’t know who wants to go – this is where zoom calls will come in very handy.”
Barrick prepared to give Mali more than half of economic spoils to end fiscal dispute
The dispute over taxes and revenue sharing has been going on for many months. In late September, Malian authorities arrested four of Barrick’s employees in the same dispute, holding them in custody for several days before releasing them.
Last month the authorities arrested three employees of Australian-based Resolute Mining, including its CEO, Terence Holohan, and held them for more than a week, until the company promised to pay US$160-million to resolve a tax dispute.
Amid a long-term rise in the price of gold, many countries around the world have hiked royalties on Western miners and sometimes used aggressive tactics to get a better deal.
Barrick itself endured years of protracted negotiations with Tanzania in East Africa and more recently with Papua New Guinea in the southwestern Pacific that ultimately saw it fork over a much bigger piece of the economic benefits to both.
Barrick has repeatedly said it is close to reaching a deal in Mali to settle all differences. In late September it announced what it called an agreement with the government. Since then, however, it has become increasingly clear the announcement was premature.
Mr. Bristow said last month that Barrick is willing to give the Malian government more than half of its economic benefits in the country in an effort to resolve the dispute.
Several years ago, another Canadian miner, Toronto-based Centerra Gold Inc., saw its biggest gold mine nationalized after a dispute with Kyrgyzstan in Central Asia went completely off the rails.
Barrick, however, has a history of eventually patching up disputes with host governments, which gives Mr. Ing confidence that it will emerge with a workable pact with Mali. Centerra’s experience in Kyrgyzstan has shown the risk of host governments going too far.
“There’s no question that governments will push and there’ll be a to and fro,” Mr. Ing said. “But on a longer-term basis, what they risk is having the golden goose who doesn’t lay any more eggs.”
The Malian government has threatened to take back a part of Barrick’s Loulo-Gounkoto complex, which is projected to produce more than half a million ounces of gold this year. The government, accusing Barrick of failing to fulfill its commitments, said last month that it might allow one of the operating permits at the complex to expire.
Barrick owns 80 per cent of the complex, but the government introduced a new mining code last year that envisions the government holding ownership stakes of as much as 35 per cent in Mali’s mines.
Barrick says it has invested US$10-billion in Mali’s economy, generating 5 to 10 per cent of the country’s entire GDP. Its mining assets have reportedly attracted the attention of Russian companies, which have become increasingly active in the country after the government recruited about 1,000 Russian soldiers to bolster its fight against rebel militias in northern Mali.
Barrick shares fell 2.7 per cent on the Toronto Stock Exchange on Thursday to close at $23.79 apiece.