Belvedere Resources drills Kopsa gold project in Finland

Attractive drill results from the Kopsa gold project in Finland sent the shares of  Belvedere Resources (BEL-V) up 18.75% or 3.5¢ to 19¢ in mid-day trading in Toronto.

The Kopsa gold-copper project is about 15 km from Belvedere’s Hitura nickel mine and mill, and the Vancouver-based company is considering its potential as a satellite mining operation.

The current drilling focused on shallow, near-surface mineralisation in the main zone, which remains open to the east and west.

Assay results were received from the first 11 holes drilled on the western strike extents of the main zone.

Highlights included Hole BELKOPDD043, which returned 38.81 metres of 5.17 grams gold per tonne and 41.68 meters of 2.14 grams per tonne. Hole BelkopDD34 returned 41.68 metres of 2.14 grams gold per tonne. The hole also extended the high-grade core zone 40 metres westward.

Previously reported assays such as BelKopDD33 and 34 intersected the main zone 200 metres west of previous intersections, which the company says almost doubles the known strike length of the deposit.

Hole BELKOPDD033 returned 15.87 metres of 0.87 gram gold and hole BELKOPDD034 cut 27.17 metres of 1.26 grams gold. Intersections are estimated to be 85-95% of true width.

Early last month Belvedere announced that it would be restarting its Hitura nickel mine, which has been on care and maintenance since December 2008.

Development works are expected to start this month with full production scheduled to begin in August.

Belvedere has signed an offtake agreement for nickel, copper and cobalt concentrate from the Hitura mine with China’s Jinchuan Group. Deliveries are expected to start in August.

As for Kopsa, David Pym, the company’s chief executive, told the Northern Miner that with the restart of the Hitura mine, with its fully permitted tailings dam and mill, it wouldn’t be a huge capital cost to get Kopsa into production.

“Visually there are some very interesting holes coming up,” Pym said, adding that an initial resource estimate should be ready by the middle of July.

“We want to bring Kopsa into production in 2012 if the metallurgy shapes up,” he said.