Irish explorer and developer Conroy Diamonds & Gold claims Ireland’s first million oz gold resource at its Clontibret prospect.

The Dublin-based company says appraisal and evaluation by independent mining consultant G. Zandonai and others have led to an upgrading of the Clontibret gold resource to 440,000 oz indicated and 590,000 oz inferred, for a total of 1.03 million oz. AIM-quoted Conroy says this follows a 25 per cent reduction in the cut-off grade, but argues it would still represent a 70 per cent resource increase using the old cut-off and stresses the new resource relates to only 20 per cent of the target area at Clontibret.

The new estimates suggest that the indicated resource averages a modest 1.24 grammes of gold per tonne of ore, with the inferred grading 1.32 grammes a tonne. Advisers say these grades are adequate for open-pit mining.

Chairman Professor Richard Conroy says the company now has ‘a sound basis for pre-feasibility studies’, to move the project forward, at a cost. Shares in Conroy Diamonds & Gold fell from their 2000 float price of 25p to only 1.62p in 2005 on impatience with moving projects to the next phase and now stand at 3.88p, up 0.75p this morning, where solid progress in the direction of production could help them rally further.

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Conroy Diamonds	AIM	£2.54m	2.50p	0.00p
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