Ashanti Gold Corp. announced positive initial metallurgical test work for Kossanto East mineralized material. These metallurgical studies were conducted on oxidized and unoxidized mineralized samples from the Gourbassi East and West target zones on the Kossanto East project, Mali. The samples represented a range of head grades. Samples were shipped to Blue Coast Research in Parksville, B.C.Canada for gold recovery tests. Ten composite samples representing a total mineralized mass of 90.8 kg were tested. Cyanidation tests were conducted as standard 48-hour bottle roll tests. During these tests 1000 grams of sample was added to a bottle along with water to 40% solids. Sodium cyanide (NaCN) was maintained at 1.0 g/L of solution. Lime was added as necessary to control the pH above 10.5. Kinetic checks were conducted after 2, 6, 24 and 48 hours to measure gold recovery and reagent consumption. A primary grind of 80% passing 100µm was targeted for each test. With the exception of a single low-grade sample from Gourbassi West, the composite samples had gold recovery from 85.8% to 95.4%. Gold recovery appears to be relatively consistent across samples with no trends observed with respect to head grades. Blue Coast also noted that the Gourbassi East composites show room for gold recovery improvement with additional testing. Gourbassi West row does not include one outlier sample result which was low recovery.