Gold Race in Sakadrisi Layer

Manon Bokuchava, Kvemo Kartli

Status was seized from the culture heritage monument of 3030-2918 BC located in Sakdrisi small town, Bolnisi district. The commission set up by the Ministry of Culture decided that the status was groundlessly granted to the layer in the past; nowadays special brigades work to extract gold in the area.

Archeologists, who were inspecting the layer for many years and discovered many ancient instruments for gold-mining, regret that the country voluntarily declined the culture heritage. They state the Sakdrisi sand-pit is the ancient place in the world, where gold was mined.

Despite the attempt of archeologists, the Ministry of Culture cancelled the status and Company RMG, which was interested in obtaining gold in the area, is now free to continue mining process. Although the Ministry claims no archeological research found gold in the layer, the company is actively looking for the gold there.

Humanrights.ge visited Sakdrisi Layer and took photos of the ongoing activities there. In every 10-15 minutes trucks drive towards the layer through central motorway of Dmanisi district and return back loaded. Workers explained that inspection and boring activities are going on in the layer. They say the raw materials are worked out across the mountain and this process is called “poring”. As a result of chemical coercion, they receive gold and copper from the raw materials.

The ore is extracted on the slopes of two rocks. A separate hill is created from the ruins of the rocks. Light blue and golden layers are seen on the rock slopes; most stones fallen from the rocks are gold shining. It is already very difficult to find the trace of ancient gold-miners here.