JOHANNESBURG (miningweekly.com) – Australian explorer Novo Litio will take its dispute with the vendor of the mineral rights to the Sepeda lithium project to the courts in Portugal, after it failed to reach an agreement with Lusorecursos over the sale of the project.

The company, which on Friday resumed its trading on the ASX, maintains that it has a binding agreement to acquire 100% of the granted licence and exploration licence applications for the Sepeda project and that Lusorecursos is required to seek Ministerial consent for the grant and transfer of the licences.

CEO David Frances commented that the company was confident of its position and its ability to enforce its rights at Sepeda.

The application for the court order will be determined in three months. Pending the outcome of the proceedings, the company is continuing with exploration activities at the Sepeda project.

Novo Litio on Friday also highlighted the results of its recent exploration activities in Portugal and Sweden.

At Sepeda, infill diamond drilling had produced the thickest, highest grade intercepts to date, including 70.88 m at 1.74% lithium and 83.1 m at 1.43% lithium.

Exploration diamond drilling also further extended the current known mineralisation by 190 m down plunge, with results including 56.97 m at 1.46% lithium. The mineralised shoot remains open down dip and down plunge at depth.

Exploration will continue in September, after which pilot plant processing will start, using material from the Phase 4 diamond drilling.

“These are our best results to date. All indications point to the likelihood of a larger, higher confidence mineral resource in the next resource update,” Frances commented.

A mineral resource update is planned for the fourth quarter of 2017.

SWEDISH PROJECT
In Sweden, Novo Litio has received its first exploration fieldwork results from Spodumenberget, one of the projects in its Swedish lithium portfolio.

Surface sampling has yielded high-grade lithium alues, including 2.77% lithium, from spodumene-bearing rock chip samples. Mapping has shown the presence of pegmatite outcrops over a strike length of 340 m and up to 100 m wide with surrounding areas masked by glacial cover.  Interpretation of the results is under way to define drill targets.

In addition to the spodumene, the programme defined outrops of tin/tantalum bearing pegmatite. The company said it would explore this potential in future programmes.