The PKKP Aboriginal Corporation RNTBC

The 46,000-year-old sacred rock shelters were legally destroyed last year. The cultural heritage bill, designed to prevent another such incident, was introduced into the WA parliament last week and it could be law by Christmas, but investors and many traditional owners in the state are not happy with it.

A federal parliamentary inquiry is set to deliver its final report into Rio Tinto's destruction of the ancient Juukan Gorge rock shelters in Western Australia.

Rio blew up the 46,000-year-old caves on Puutu Kunti Kurrama and Pinikura country in May 2020, devastating the traditional owners.

The mining giant had legal permission to destroy the caves under WA's long-criticised Aboriginal Heritage Act but has since conceded it breached the PKKP's trust.

The mining giant Rio Tinto has surprised observers with its latest attempt to demonstrate accountability over its catastrophic blasting of the 46,000 year old Juukan Gorge rock shelters in the Pilbara last year, with the announcement its chairman and a director are standing down.

As a senate inquiry investigates Rio Tinto’s destruction of the Juukan Gorge caves, Senator Pat Dodson says a royal commission into the entire Native Title Act may be necessary as the law ‘has been basically brought into disrepute by the capacity of those who are rich and powerful’.

The destruction of 46,000-year-old Juukan Gorge sites in the Pilbara has created great distress for their traditional owners, seismic shockwaves for heritage professionals and appalled the general public.

Mining giant says it has ‘much work to do’ to rebuild trust as it pledges to consult more with Aboriginal custodians in wake of Juukan Gorge debacle.

Rio Tinto chief executive officer Jean-Sebastien Jacques will have his pay docked by around 38 per cent following a review of the practices and systems that led to the destruction of the heritage Juukan rockshelters in the Pilbara in May.