I doubt very much that Chavez will accept swapping one 'publicly traded western capitalist company' for another. If he won't ( probably ), give the permit to KRY, he won't give it to a Barrick consortium.

"" I still think it will be Rusoro in a stock swap deal.""

However, I also don't see Rusoro as being the one to put this together.

On the other hand, we still have Venrus, quietly lurking in the background. They just got the old mill, Hecla I believe? And then we have this.

'Venezuela and the Russian-Canadian miner Rusoro announced earlier this year the development of large gold reserves valued at up to $30 billion at the Las Cristinas and Brisas mines.'

I still think that, however it materializes, it will be Venrus that is ulimately the entity that mines LC. It may be a bit of a convoluted path to that end, but once Fung works out the deal with whomever, and the problem with transfering/selling the MOC is worked out, I believe it will be Venrus in the drivers seat.

But then again........IMO

Penderite