Centamin finds new high-grade gold zone in Egypt

Centamin Egypt (CEE-T, CEY-L, CNT-A) continues to intersect high-grade gold zones at its Sukari Hill project where the company says it is developing Egypts first large-scale modern gold mine.

Drilling at Sukari in the countrys eastern desert region returned high-grade gold assay results from hole RCD1221.

Centamin intersected a zone of 22 metres at 21.83 grams gold per tonne at a vertical depth from 549 metres, containing a higher grade zone of 8 metres at 58.58 grams gold per tonne with visible gold from 559 metres.

This particular mineralized intersection sits outside the current optimized pit shell and also outside the upgraded 2.6 million oz. gold measured, 4.2 million oz. indicated and 3.6 million oz. inferred resource. Ongoing drilling is expected to add significantly to this resource, the company says.

The intersection in hole RCD1221 is a high-grade structure parallel to and below the Hapi Zone, the company stated in a press release.

This deeper structure correlates to 6 metres at 15.21 grams gold per tonne in hole RCD521 from 542 metres, and an adjacent zone containing abundant visible gold and sulphide, intersected in recently drilled hole RCD11280, for which assay results are pending.

Centamin has been exploring for gold in Egypt since 1995, and in 2005 was granted a 160 sq. km exploitation lease over the massive Sukari Hill gold project. It has a tenure of 30 years with the option to renew for a further 30 years.

A feasibility study to upgrade the project to a 4-5 million tonne per year operation was completed in February 2007. Construction is underway with completion estimated for the fourth quarter of 2008.

Shares of Centamin on the Toronto Stock Exchange rose $0.03 to close at $1.28 apiece on a trading volume of 2.3 million.