Venezuela also plans to enlist Russian help to build mines at its largest gold deposits, the mining minister said Thursday, apparently killing a yearslong bid by two Canadian companies to develop the projects.

An accord was to be signed on Friday with Russian-owned Rusoro to operate the Las Cristinas and Brisas projects with Venezuela, Sanz told a Russian delegation.

Las Cristinas, one of Latin America's largest gold projects, is currently operated by Canada's Crystallex, which waited in vain for years for an environmental license to start mining.

Nearby, Brisas is operated by Gold Reserve, which has a concession for the mainly gold project but was also waiting for environmental permits.

While it appeared that Sanz will replace Crystallex and Gold Reserve with Rusoro, he did not mention their names.

The statements came a day after Venezuela said it wanted to recover control over its gold to boost its reserves as a shield from global financial crisis.

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