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RNS Number : 9576T

Weatherly International PLC

14 December 2011

Weatherly International Plc ("Weatherly" or the "Company")

Chairman's Statement and Result of AGM

At the Annual General Meeting ("AGM") of the Company held earlier today, 14 December 2011, all the resolutions proposed were duly passed by shareholders. During the AGM, John Bryant, Non-Executive Chairman of the Company, made the following statement:

"It has been a very productive year for Weatherly and we have achieved a great deal since our last AGM.

Our chief objective for the year was to get our mines back into production, which we have achieved without recourse to our shareholders, funding it from loans and asset sales.

Other key objectives for the year were:

   --      To progress our two development opportunities, Tschudi and Tsumeb tailings; 

-- To float the new JV Company with our Chinese partners on AIM in order to progress the Lead Zinc project at Berg Aukas; and

-- To form a strong management team to take the Company forward in its development on all fronts.

I am pleased to say we have achieved all of our objectives, albeit with some delays, but we have nonetheless delivered on what we said we would do.

The delays often arose from factors beyond our control but we have persevered and solved problems creatively to achieve the objectives.

I would now like to give you an update on where we are on our projects.

Central Operations

Output at our mines is increasing but the ramp up has not been without difficulties. Matchless is performing very well but there have been some problems at Otjihase. These have caused production to dip but our management team is addressing this and solving the problems with permanent solutions that give us confidence about future production. We did not achieve budgeted output in October but in November total output was 550t and in December we expect to be producing at the designated rate of 580t/month or 7,000 annualised tonnes of copper per annum.

Tschudi and Tsumeb

The Feasibility study for Tschudi is underway as are our discussions with potential lenders. We will be receiving the first cut of the feasibility study early next year and we aim to finalise this to enable an investment decision to be taken in mid-2012. The Tsumeb Tailings project is being assessed to establish whether there are sufficient synergies for it to be developed as an enhancement to the Tschudi project rather than as a standalone project.

If no such opportunities are identified the Tsumeb Tailings project will take its position after the expansion of our central operations and the Tschudi project.

Outlook

Looking ahead to next year, maintaining and building upon the success at Central Operations is a priority and we are currently examining ways of increasing the output in the short term.

These are uncertain times and as a Board we have taken a very prudent, even cautious, view of risk management and we will continue our policy of forward selling approximately 35% of our output.

I am grateful to our staff for their hard work and creativity during the year. A thank you to Rod Webster who has lead the team so successfully this year. I am also grateful to our shareholders for their continuing support and can assure that we are all working to deliver shareholder in the future."

End

For further information please contact:

   Weatherly International Plc                                             +44 (0) 20 7917 2989 

Rod Webster, Chief Executive Officer

Dean Friday, Investor Relations

   Collins Stewart Europe Limited                                        +44 (0) 20 7523 8350 

John Prior, Adam Miller, Sebastian Jones

   4C Communications (Investor Relations)                          +44 (0) 20 3170 7973 

Carina Corbett

This information is provided by RNS

The company news service from the London Stock Exchange

END

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