Is gold theft something we need to worry about?

I have been following a few small companies that have projects in Mali, a very gold-rich place. A poster put a link to a video by a blogger that was made very recently by the looks of it. By the map in the video, it looks to be very close to Dandoko. They had a lot of gear and were taking 6,000 ounces a month. In one way it is good to see how rich the ground is in that area, but is anyone worried about the security implications? I see some guys with guns in the video! I bet they are using mercury to recover the gold as well.