"Among our Alaskan Native tribes, a promise made is a promise kept. For generations, survival in the Far North depended on this trust.

Such promises over the generations have kept our populations of wild sockeye salmon, which sustain our culture and feed our families, plentiful and healthy.

Last year, Ms. Cynthia Carroll, the CEO of London-based mining giant Anglo American PLC, gave Alaskans a promise.

In a private meeting with Alaskans in London, including one of this piece's authors, Carroll promised that her company would not build its proposed Pebble gold and copper mine if local residents didn't support it.

She echoed that private agreement in an interview with the Harvard Business School Alumni Bulletin: "We will not go where communities are against us," she said.

We intended to travel to London this week to make sure Ms. Carroll keeps her promise and upholds the principles she says Anglo American exemplifies and practices. However, volcanic ash spewed from an Icelandic volcano dashed that plan.

Still, not even a volcano can stop us from holding Anglo American and its CEO to their promises."

Get the Story:
Bobby Andrew and George Wilson: Mining giant should keep its Pebble promise (The Anchorage Daily News 4/25)

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