China plans to destroy ancient Buddhist city to get copper bonanza

Two Chinese state-owned mining companies plan to destroy an ancient Buddhist city in Afghanistan in order to get the copper underneath it, according to a new documentary According to the film "Saving Mes Aynak," Metallurgical Group Corp. (MCC) and Jiangxi Copper are in the initial stages of building an open-pit copper mine 25 miles southeast of Kabul. The location is home to a walled Buddhist city that dates back 5,000 years.According to the Afghan Ministry of Mines and Petroleum, the site is also home to the world's second-largest copper deposit. China is an importer of copper and a major global refiner of the industrial metal. In 2007, under the administration of President Hamid Karzai, MCC agreed to pay Afghanistan $3 billion to lease the Mes Aynak area for 30 years. MCC plans to extract over $100 billion worth of copper deposited directly beneath the Buddhist city, according to the documentary. 

Mariam Amini, 'China plans to destroy an ancient Buddhist city to get the copper buried there' CNBC, 1 Feb 2017

China is of course one of the countries with which there is a repatriation MOU. Perhaps they should be made to show they can look after their own heritage before the MOU is extended.