Anglo Asian Mining PLC (AIM:AAZ, FRA:A4A, OTC:AGXKF) (AIM:AAZ) has published a maiden mineral resource estimate for its Zafar polymetallic deposit in western Azerbaijan.
The deposit is estimated to have 8.47 million tonnes of mineralisation with average grades of 0.60% copper, 0.47% zinc and 0.30 grammes per tonne (g/t) of gold.
The in-situ mineral resource has been put at 51,000 tonnes of copper, 82,000 ounces of gold and 40,000 tonnes of zinc, Anglo Asian said.
"Zafar's maiden mineral resource estimate is extremely encouraging and will help underpin the company's future long-term production growth," said Reza Vaziri, the chief executive officer of Anglo Asian.
“Located in close proximity to our existing Gedabek processing plant, there are significant operational and geographical synergies which will help us rapidly develop this resource. We are now highly focused on completing the final mineral reserve estimation of the deposit by the end of the year and successfully bringing Zafar into production as soon as possible,” he added.
Stephen Westhead, the vice-president of Anglo Asian, also described the results as “encouraging”.
“Exploration is being fast-tracked to assess the economics of the project with a view to starting production in 2023. The team are highly motivated by this aggressive approach and are working to rapidly complete the mineral reserves and mine plan of this challenging project,” Westhead said.
“In the vicinity of the Zafar deposit are a number of other exciting prospects where ZTEM anomalies have been defined. With the ramp-up of drilling capacity, the company looks forward to further announcements as this project develops. The geology team at Gedabek has recently been strengthened and is supported by new equipment including XRD analysers, three-dimensional core logging tools and new technical software,” he added.