İliç District
İliç District is a district of the Erzincan Province of Turkey. Its seat is the town of İliç.Erzincan Province in Turkey. The village is populated by Kurds of the Şikakî tribe and had a population of 289 in 2022.
Mining
In 1999, a gold-silver-copper ore deposit was explored near the village. The
Çöpler mine
The Çöpler mine is one of the largest gold mines in Turkey and in the world, operated by the American Çalık_Holding#Mining, Alacer Gold Corporation. The mine is located in Erzincan Province. The mine has estimated reserves of 6 million oz of go ...
started production of gold in 2010. Mining accidents occurred in June 2022 when a leak in the
cyanide
Cyanide is a naturally occurring, rapidly acting, toxic chemical that can exist in many different forms.
In chemistry, a cyanide () is a chemical compound that contains a functional group. This group, known as the cyano group, consists of a ...
pipeline polluted the environment, and in February 2024 when a large mass (estimated at 10 million cubic metres) of
heap leach
Heap leaching is an industrial mining process used to extract precious metals, copper, uranium, and other compounds from ore using a series of chemical reactions that absorb specific minerals and re-separate them after their division from other e ...
material slid down into the valley, and nine miners were trapped under the landslide.