RIO DE JANEIRO - Brazilian mining firm Samarco promised Monday to pay at least $260 million for damage from the bursting of two dams which unleashed torrents of waste that flattened a village, prosecutors said.
Brazil's Samarco mining firm pledged November 16 to pay at least $260 million to help remediate environmental damage after a deadly November 5 dam failure deluged a vilalge in Minas Gerais
The company signed a "preliminary commitment" to "guarantee payment for preventive emergency mitigation, repair or compensation measures" after the deadly disaster, the state prosecution service said in a statement.
Samarco is owned by Australia-based BHP Billiton, the world's largest mining company, and Brazil's Vale, the largest iron ore miner.
Ten people were killed when two dams at a waste reserve burst on November 5 in the southeastern region of Minas Gerais.
The rupture unleashed a torrent of mud that buried the village of Bento Rodrigues and caused widespread interruption of drinking water supplies in the area.
"We know that the amount of damages could be much greater, but the agreement establishes a firm legal guarantee," prosecutor Carlos Eduardo Ferreira Pinto was quoted as saying in the statement.
A Brazilian court on Friday had already frozen about $78 million from Samarco's accounts for the future payment of potential damages to victims.