Shear Minerals Ltd. (TSXV:SRM), Stornoway Ventures Ltd. (TSXV:SWY) and BHP Billiton today announced micro diamond results from the first eleven kimberlites discovered on the Churchill Diamond Project. Micro diamond results for a further five kimberlite pipes discovered in the second phase of drilling are expected before the end of the year.

Diamonds were recovered from six kimberlites as follows:

"The joint venture partners remain confident about the potential of the Project," said Pam Strand, President and CEO of Shear. "We have discovered 16 new kimberlite pipes in the last four months, clearly identifying a new kimberlite province. In addition, the high-confidence diamond indicator minerals recovered from till samples on the property support the likelihood of moderate to high grade diamondiferous kimberlites in this province. It's just a matter of tracking them down. We are in the very early days of what is going to be an aggressive multi-phase, multi-discipline exploration program."

Ms. Strand said that next year, the exploration program will be assisted and guided by results from a larger database of more then 1,500 till samples which are being collected this year. This will help to better refine and geochemically support the selection of drill targets. "Going forward, our effort will be focused on tracking down the source of the high-confidence diamond indicator mineral chemistry recovered on our property to date."

Said Eira Thomas, Stornoway's President and CEO: "In our first season of drilling we have discovered a new kimberlite province and established that it is diamond bearing. These results are comparable with early stage exploration of the prolific Slave Craton that hosts Canada's two producing diamond mines and where many of the initial kimberlite discoveries contained few diamonds. We remain confident that higher priority drill targets will be identified from the sampling work conducted in 2OO3."

The 2003 field program is under the supervision of Dean Besserer, P. Geol. of APEX Geoscience Ltd., a Qualified Person under NI 43-101. Mr. Besserer is responsible for all aspects of the projects supervision including Quality Assurance, Quality Control, and sample Chain of Custody.

The Churchill Diamond Project encompasses more than 1.5 million acres located near the community of Rankin Inlet in the Kivalliq region of Nunavut. Airborne geophysical surveys have identified more than 325 geophysical anomalies on the property to date, of which 26 have been drill tested. This drill testing has identified 16 kimberlites on the main Churchill area and an additional two on the International Samuel Churchill West area. Shear has a 51% interest in the project and is operator. Stornoway and BHP Billiton have 35% and 14% interests respectively.

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