Las Calandria Gold-Silver Project Expands

Mariana Resources Ltd. (‘Mariana’) will shortly commence drilling at the company’s 100% owned Las Calandrias Project(including the new El Nido dome complex)in Santa Cruz Province, Argentina. This follows the completion of detailed mapping, rock chip geochemistry and an Induced Polarization Survey (IP)after the Calandria Sur discovery in late 2009.

Highlights

· Detailed mapping to the west and northwest of the mineralised Calandria Sur and Calandria Norte domes discovered a northeast trending belt 3.5 km x 2.5 km, of multiple prospective rhyolite domes (‘El Nido’) · Outcropping sulphidic vein and breccia mineralisation has been found at a number of El Nido localities with rock chips assaying up to 2.7 g/t Au and 638 g/t Ag

· The IP survey at Calandria Sur, Calandria Norte and El Nido Este detected sizeable chargeability anomalies, which could reflect disseminated sulphides at depth

· A minimum 3,000 m drill programme is to commence shortly to follow up the Calandria Sur discovery with infill and step out holes and to test selected priority targets at Calandria Norte and El Nido Este Commenting today, Managing Director of Mariana Resources Ltd, John Sutcliffe said

“The recently discovered 10sq km Las Calandrias – El Nido dome complex greatly increases the exploration potential of the Las Calandrias project for both high-grade vein and bulk tonnage mineralisation. The recent IP survey has highlighted some priority concealed targets. An exciting drill campaign is about to start and will follow up the Calandria Sur gold-silver discovery andscout drill selected IP targets elsewhere on the property.”

Las Calandrias

Las Calandrias Project (formerly Dos Calandrias) now includes the Calandria Sur and Calandria Norte mineralised rhyolite dome complexes in the southeastern part of the project area and the recently discovered El Nido dome complex located to the west (Figure 1). The 2009 drilling campaign discovered significant disseminated style gold mineralisation around the eastern brecciated margin of the Calandria Sur dome. Intersections included 91.5m @ 1.6 g/t Au (CSD 15) and 102m @ 1.2 g/t Au (CSD 13) – News Releases 19/10/09, 28/10/09.

El Nido

Additional exploration has resulted in the recent discovery of the El Nido rhyolite dome complex. It consists of several coalescent rhyolite domes along a northeast trending 3.5km x 2.5km belt 2km west and northwest of the Calandria Sur and Calandria Norte domes. Veins and sulphide breccias have been identified at El Nido Sur, El Nido Norte and El Nido Centro, mostly at dome margins, indicating possible similarities with Calandria Sur. Recent reconnaissance rock chip sampling at El Nido Norte is encouraging with five out of 13 samples assaying above 1.4 g/t Au, and up to 2.7 g/t Au and 638g/t Ag. El Nido has the potential to generate new targets for drilling in the next campaign.

IP Survey

A leading geophysical company, Quantec Geoscience Limited(Quantec), carried out a 3D IP and Resistivity survey over mapped rhyolite domes at Las Calandrias. Survey dimensions were approximately 1.4 km x 2.5 km using an Offset Pole-Dipole 3D array. The objective was to detect disseminated sulphide zones at depth and better define rhyolite dome geometry. In addition, a N-S pole-dipole test array and five pole-dipole “scout” sections each of 500m were carried out at El Nido.

Sizeable chargeability anomalies were detected within the IP grid at Calandria Sur, Calandria Norte and El Nido Este which could reflect sulphide mineralisation. At Calandrias Sur, the 8mV/V IP anomaly iso-surface produces an elongated figure with approximate dimensions 220m east-west x 350m north-south x 150 depth extent but the largest anomaly is at El Nido Este, measuring approximately 470m N-S x 300m E-W x 150m depth extent.

In a preliminary report and 3D images received from Quantec, Senior Geophysicist, Miles Rideout comments as follows:

“Sizeable IP anomalies were detected both at Calandrias South and Calandrias North demonstrating moderately elevated chargeabilities, peaking at approximately 18 mV/V and 16 mV/V respectively. These two IP anomalies demonstrate the probable distribution of sulphides, which accompany mineralisation, and provide new information to extend drill targeting. Several drill holes have shown that mineralisation can continue outwards to the 8mV/V chargeability level. The dimensions of the 8 mV/V IP iso-surface anomalies plotted in Figure 4 are reported below. Due to the complex forms of these anomalous features, these dimensions do not represent block volumes.

· At Calandrias South, the 8mV/V IP anomaly iso-surface produces an elongated figure with approximate dimensions 220m east-west x 350m north-south x 150 depth extent.

· At Calandrias North, the 8mV/V anomaly iso-surface produces a complex figure, where the central mass has approximate dimensions 570m east-west x 260m north-south x 180m depth extent. There appear to be structural extensions to this chargeability feature to the north and west.

On the west side of the 3D survey block, a large new chargeable target zone has been detected at the Nido Este target. This new target demonstrates geophysical values similar to the two mineralised zones previously tested (peaking above 18 mV/V), but represents a larger target volume.