WEST AFRICAN EXPLORATION

This year, 2010, will be an exciting year for exploration at Golden Star. The exploration budget has been increased to $18 million, approximately double the exploration budget from 2009. The lion’s share of this will be spent around our plants at Bogoso/Prestea and Wassa. We will be drilling new targets, upgrading resources into reserves and growing our reserve/resource base.

Bogoso/Prestea Exploration

Drill targets have been identified and prioritized along the Bogoso/Prestea land package. In late 2009, drilling commenced at some of the identified drill targets and this program continued into 2010.
One of the exciting results from this drilling campaign has been the new discovery south of the Buesichem pit—Buesichem South. Information regarding this discovery is set forth in more detail below.

Buesichem and Buesichem South Resource—July 2010

Golden Star Resources Ltd. announced a preliminary mineral resource estimate and pit optimization results from the new discovery at Buesichem (now called Buesichem South deposit) on July 21, 2010. The Buesichem South discovery added 500,000 ounces of gold to the Buesichem resource base bringing the Buesichem total to 134,000 ounces of Measured and Indicated Mineral Resources and 497,000 ounces of Inferred Mineral Resource that with further drilling will extend the life of the Buesichem pit by several years. The Buesichem South discovery is open ended to the south and drilling is continuing. To date, an additional 62 holes totaling 14,700 meters (m) have been drilled on a nominal 50 m X 50 m grid interval.
At the end of 2009, the Measured and Indicated Mineral Resources at Buesichem, before the discovery of Buesichem South, were 0.95 million tonnes grading 2.68 g/t gold totaling 82,000 ounces of gold with an additional Inferred Mineral Resource of 0.46 million tonnes grading 3.40 g/t gold for 50,000 ounces of gold. The revised resource estimates are tabulated below. Golden Star reports resources constrained within an optimized pit shell which uses operating costs and recoveries based on our current operations at the Bogoso Processing facility and a gold price of $1,100 per ounce. Most of the additional Mineral Resources are currently classified as inferred and are attributed to the new Buesichem South discovery with the remainder ascribed to the $100 per ounce increase in gold price used in the calculations.

Notes to Non Reserves—Measured and Indicated Mineral Resources:

• The Mineral Resources were estimated in accordance with the definitions and requirements of Canada’s National Instrument 43-101. The Mineral Resources are equivalent to Mineralized Material as defined by the SEC Industry Guide 7.
• The Mineral Resources were constrained between the $850 per ounce gold 2009 engineered pit design and the $1100 per ounce gold engineered pit design.
• The Mineral Resources were constrained using optimized pit shells at a gold price of $1,100 per ounce from which the Mineral Reserves have been subtracted.
• The Mineral Resources are not included and are in addition to the Mineral Reserves.
• Resources above do not include mining loss or dilution.
• The Mineral Resources are shown on a 100% basis. The Mineral Resources shown above are subject to the Government of Ghana’s 10% carried interest which entitles it to a 10% dividend once capital costs have been recovered.
• The Qualified Person for the estimation of the Mineral Resources is S. Mitchel Wasel, Golden Star Resources Vice President of Exploration.

The additional constrained resources have been added to an area along trend and south of the existing mining operations with a small proportion of the additional resources being located beneath existing open pits. Currently two multi-purpose drill rigs are infill drilling on 25 m spaced drill fences. A third drill rig will be redirected to the Buesichem South Zone to accelerate this Inferred Mineral Resource conversion so that we can fully assess the potential of this material for Mineral Reserve conversion and extend the Buesichem pit mine life.
The Buesichem deposit has been known since the 1930’s when high grade oxide material was mined from a small open pit over a 20-year period. Golden Star acquired the deposit in 2001 as part of the Prestea Mining Lease acquisition and Buesichem provided a source of oxide ore for the Bogoso oxide plant for nearly two years. Sulfide ore mining commenced at Buesichem in May 2006 and approximately 500,000 ounces of gold have been mined and processed from this single pit thus far. With the discovery of Buesichem South, this deposit could exceed one million ounces of production, becoming the largest single open pit reserve and resource at Bogoso/Prestea to date.

QA-QC

The technical contents of this press release have been reviewed and verified by S. Mitchel Wasel, BSc Geology, a Qualified Person pursuant to Canada’s National Instrument 43-101. Mr. Wasel is Vice President Exploration for Golden Star and an active member of the Australasian Institute of Mining and Metallurgy.
The results herein are based on the analysis of saw-split HQ sized (64mm) diamond half core or a three kilogram single stage riffle split of a nominal 25 to 30 kg Reverse Circulation chip sample which has been sampled over nominal one meter intervals (adjusted where necessary for mineralized structures). Sample preparation and analyses have been carried out at SGS Laboratories in Tarkwa using a 50 gram assay charge with a flame Atomic Absorption Spectrophotometry (AAS) finish and a detection limit of 0.01 ppm. All analytical work is subject to a systematic and rigorous Quality Assurance-Quality Control (QA-QC). At least 5% of samples are certified standards and the accuracy of the analysis is confirmed to be acceptable from comparison of the recommended and actual ‘standards’ results. The remaining half core is stored on site for future inspection and detailed logging.
The Mineral Resource estimates have been estimated by our technical personnel in accordance with definitions and guidelines set out in the Definition Standards for Mineral Resources and Mineral Reserves published by the Canadian Institute of Mining, Metallurgy, and Petroleum and as required by Canada’s National Instrument 43-101.

Akropong Trend (earning 90%)

The Akropong Trend is a mineralized corridor trending sub-parallel to and west of the Ashanti Trend approximately 20 kilometers from Bogoso/Prestea. We have continued to evaluate our propertyholdings in this area, dropping tested non-prospective ground and picking up additional untested ground through joint ventures. The objective of this work was to identify additional mineral reserve opportunities in the immediate vicinity of Bogoso/Prestea that could, in the future, provide additional sources of processing plant feed for the Bogoso processing plants.

Our exploration geologists are mapping rock exposures that have been revealed through mining activities in order to determine controls to ore mineralization. The combination of this exploration mapping and detailed grade control drilling will be used to determine the potential for further gold mineralization along this trend and will be tested in 2008. Several gold anomalies have already been identified in the projected southern extension of the Pampe South Trend.

Drilling at the Pampe property established a Measured and Indicated Mineral Resource at Pampe in 2005 and we commenced mining from this deposit in 2007.

The other Akropong Trend projects are still at an early stage of exploration and to date they do not have proven and probable mineral reserves.

Dunkwa (90%)

In 2003, we acquired two prospecting licenses, Asikuma and Mansiso, collectively referred to as the Dunkwa properties. These properties are located on the Ashanti Trend directly north of and contiguous with the current Bogoso mining lease.

Exploration on the Dunkwa concessions dates back to the 1930's when at least five quartz vein occurrences were prospected but not developed. The mineralization is similar to that seen at Bogoso. The Mampon prospect located on the northern portion of the Dunkwa properties was discovered in 1988 using regional geochemical methods and was subsequently drilled by the previous operators.

The Mansiso and Asikuma Prospecting Licenses were flown by VTEM airborne geophysical system in 2007. In order to interpret this geophysical data, a regional geological mapping program was completed since limited data existed previously. The geophysical data has been and is being analyzed to determine prospective drill targets and their priority. We expect to follow up on the VTEM targets as well as the down dip extensions of the Mampon deposit.

WASSA EXPLORATION - GHANA (90% interest)

The exploration program at Wassa/HBB has continued since the acquisition of the HBB properties in late 2005. Prospective areas are being explored with geochemical sampling, auger drilling, RAB drilling and diamond drilling successively, as positive results are generated and anomalous areas outlined. The HBB corridor, through which the haul road runs, has been vastly underexplored. 

GHANA REGIONAL

Mano River Joint Venture - Sierra Leone (earning up to 85% interest)

In late 2003 we entered into a joint venture agreement with Mano River Resources Inc., which holds seven gold properties in central Sierra Leone. Golden Star may earn an interest in these properties between 51 and 85% depending on funding elections by Mano. The projects, including Nimini, Sonfon, and Pampana North and South, are located in the Archean Nimini Hills and Sula Mountains Greenstone Belts where numerous banded iron formation (bif) and shear-zone-hosted gold occurrences have been identified.

Modern exploration of these prospects, some of which were significant alluvial gold producers in the 1930s to 50s, was just commencing when the Sierra Leone civil war broke out in the mid 90s. Prior to this, UNDP and EU funded prospecting programs had completed geochemical sampling, trenching, and limited drilling at several locations with encouraging results.

Exploration activities at the Mano River joint venture concentrated on the Sonfon prospect. Zones of massive sulfides with good grades were intersected from the 2008 drilling and follow-up drilling is planned for 2009.

COTE D'IVOIRE

Amélikia, Abengourou, and Agboville (100% interest)

These properties, which lie in east-central Côte d’Ivoire, lie within a broad zone of deformation along the northern margin of the Sefwi Belt. In Ghana, this contact hosts the >10 million ounce Ahafo deposit. Between 2005 and 2007, we carried out a regional stream and laterite sampling exploration program that identified two coincidental stream and laterite gold anomalies on the Amélika license. These two zones over an area approximately 4.5 km by 20 and 24km long, respectively. In addition, a smaller 4 km by 8 km coincident laterite and stream anomaly was also identified on the Abengourou license. Exploration activities in 2009 will focus on following up these anomalies with further soil sampling on a tighter grid pattern with the goal of identifying future drill targets.

The exploration activities in Côte d’Ivoire have focused on interpretation of the geochemical anomalies that were identified from the sampling program. RAB drilling will commence at the Amelikia and Abengourou properties to provide more in-depth knowledge to follow-up the sampling anomalies. The most prominent target is an anomaly that is approximately 5km in strike length and up to 1.5km in width.  Similar exploration is on-going at the Agboville property.

Sierra Leone

We have a joint venture agreement with African Aura Minerals at the Sonfon project.

Burkina Faso

Riverstone Resources is earning-in to joint venture the Goulagou and Rounga properties.

Niger

A joint venture with AMI Resources is in place on the Tialkam and Deba properties.