Desert Sun Intersects 5.46 gAu/T OVER 21.9m Along the Bahia Gold Belt at Pindobacu, 50km North of Jacobina Mine.

TORONTO -- DESERT SUN MINING CORP. (TSX:DSM) (AMEX:DEZ) has received the results of a reconnaissance diamond drill program to test several target areas in the northern portion of the Bahia Gold Belt in Northeastern Brazil. In total, 10 holes totaling 2,000m were completed on selected targets over an area of 50 km by 5 km that were identified by geological mapping/sampling, soil geochemical sampling and induced polarization geophysical surveys. Results from this drilling are given in Table 1 and Figure 1 shows the location of the areas where drilling was completed. The most significant results were obtained from the Pindobacu area located 50km due north of the town of Jacobina.

Highlights from drilling at Pindobacu are:

- PB-02 which intersected 5.46 grams gold per tonne (g Au/t) over a true width of 21.9m including higher grade portions grading 12.27 g Au/t over a true width of 4.7m and 10.22 g Au/t over 5.5 m true width;

- PB-03, collared 250m south of PB-02, that returned 1.46 g Au/t over a true width of 24.4m; and

- PB-01, collared 120m north of PB-02 that intersected 7.20 g Au/t over a true width of 2.0m

Dr. Bill Pearson, P.Geo., Vice President, Exploration commented "These are excellent results from just very limited drilling on this very extensive mineralized structure. The mineralogy and geochemistry  of this system is remarkably similar to the gold mineralization in the quartz pebble conglomerates in the Jacobina mine area to the south. The regional Pindobacu Fault system, which forms the eastern boundary of the Jacobina Basin, is clearly a major focus of hydrothermal alteration and mineralization. This mineralized structure probably extends for at least 15km along strike and the alteration zone is up to 100m wide."

Bruce Humphrey, P.Eng., President stated "We are initiating a $US5 million exploration program for 2005 which will include at least 25,000 metres of diamond drilling. This program will focus on further exploring and developing major targets in the Jacobina mine area as well as significantly expanding the exploration work in the northern area of the Bahia Gold Belt, especially at Pindobacu."

The Pindobacu target is accessible by paved road from Jacobina and is 2km west of the town of Pindobacu. At Pindobacu, there are a number of active garimpos (free miner workings) which extend along a strike length of 1.2km as shown in Figure 2. Gold occurs as fine to locally coarse-grained native gold or associated with pyrite (or its weathered product, goethite) with tourmaline and fuchsite in quartz vein stockworks along low-angle thrust faults, high-angle reverse faults and fractures.

The host rocks are metagraywacke, banded iron formation and metachert of the Archean Mundo Novo Formation and strongly silicified and fuchsitic, fine to coarse-grained quartzite with minor metaconglomerates lenses of the Paleoproterozoic Jacobina Group. Alteration and mineralization occur along the contact zones of these major rock units associated with fault structures of the regional Pindobacu Fault system which forms the eastern margin of the Jacobina Basin.

Montana Minerals investigated this area during the mid-1980's by trenching and some shallow diamond drilling. After Montana, a number of garimpeiros starting mining some of the mineralized outcrops and carried out shallow underground mining, an activity that is locally and currently underway. Only partial information on the results of the Montana work is available from a report filed with the Departamento Nacional da Producao Mineral (DNPM).

Trenching and pitting by Montana was reported to outline a N10 degrees E trending mineralized zone 18 metres thick with an average grade of 1.91 g Au/t over a strike length of 800m. According to the DNPM report, Montana completed 18 shallow diamond drill holes of which only partial results are included in the report from which samples from 13 of these holes were selected for metallurgical testing. The head grade of the composite of core samples was reported to be 4.52 g Au/t with recovery after a 30 day bottle roll test reported to be 82.1%.

Geological mapping, IP surveys and rock/soil geochemical surveys by DSM indicates that the hydrothermal alteration zone is much more extensive than indicated by the previous work. The zone has been traced for at least 3.2km along strike at Pindobacu and it probably extends a further 10km to the north to Fumaca. The alteration zone is up to 100m wide.

A three hole drill program totaling 633m was completed to test different areas of the alteration system. Hole PB-02 intersected 5.46 grams gold per tonne (g Au/t) over a true width of 21.9m including higher grade portions grading 12.27 g Au/t over a true width of 4.7m and 10.22 g Au/t over 5.5 m true width. Hole PB-03, collared 250m south of PB-02, returned 1.46 g Au/t over a true width of 24.4m while Hole PB-1, collared 120m north of PB-02 intersected 7.20 g Au/t over a true width of 2.0m.

At Fumaca, located 10km north of Pindobacu, four (4) holes were completed to test several targets outlined by geological mapping/sampling, soil geochemical surveys and induced polarization surveys. Hole FN-01 tested below a garimpo where sampling by DSM had returned 7.36 g Au/t over 4.5m including a very high grade bluish-grey quartz vein 0.3m wide that returned 91 g Au/t. Although this hole intersected strongly silicified quartzites, it appears that faulting has offset the downdip extension of this zone. Hole FN-2A tested a coincident soil Au geochemical and geophysical anomaly and returned 0.72 g Au/t over 10.1m including a higher grade portion grading 1.95 g Au/t over 2.2m. Hole FN-03, located 300m west of FN-04, tested a similar target but did not intersect any significant values. Results for FN-04 located 700m east of Hole FN-1 are pending.

One drill hole was completed in each of two areas of garimpos 10km (Sambura) and 23km (Biquinha) south of Pindobacu, respectively. Both of these areas are characterized by the presence of high grade (15-30 g Au/t) narrow (1-2cm wide) quartz veins cutting andalusite-graphite-quartz schists; neither hole returned significant values. Hole CA-01 tested the potential extension of the Serra do Corrego Formation conglomerates 10km north of Jacobina. This hole intersected green fuchsite-bearing conglomerates similar to those in the Jacobina mine area but did not return any significant values.

Desert Sun owns 100% of the Jacobina Mine and the 155 km long Bahia Gold Belt in the state of Bahia, in northeastern Brazil. The mine will re-start operations in the first quarter of 2005. Based on the SNC Lavalin Feasibility Study which used a gold price of US $350 per ounce and a Real (Brazilian currency) to $ US exchange rate of 3:1, the mine can produce at a rate of 102,000 ounces of gold per year at an average cash cost of US $189 per ounce.

Assaying for the program was carried out by Lakefield Geosol, an ISO 9001, 2000 laboratory based in Brazil, using fire assay on 50 gram pulps. Check assaying is routinely carried out, by ALS Chemex in Vancouver, on 10% of sample pulps and 5% of sample rejects. Independent standard reference samples are also inserted at regular intervals into each batch of analyses. Security is maintained at the core logging and sampling facility. Dr. Bill Pearson, P.Geo. is the Qualified Person as defined under National Instrument 43-101 responsible for the scientific and technical work on the program.

Desert Sun Mining is a Canadian gold exploration and development company listed on the Toronto Stock Exchange and the American Stock Exchange. Desert Sun owns 100% of the Jacobina Mine and the 155 km long Bahia Gold Belt in the state of Bahia, in northeastern Brazil. The mine will re-start operations in the first quarter of 2005. The SNC Lavalin Feasibility Study, completed in September 2003, indicates that the mine can produce at a rate of 102,000 ounces of gold per year at an average cash cost of US $189 per ounce.

As a result of the 2004 exploration program, both Measured and Indicated resources and Inferred resources have increased significantly. Current Measured and Indicated resources now total 24,800,000 tonnes @ 2.53 g/t Au containing 2,050,000 ounces of gold. Inferred Resources total 22,000,000 tonnes @ 2.61 g/t Au containing 1,900,000 ounces of gold. The company is in the process of updating its Reserve Estimate.

Desert Sun previously released (see press release of February 12, 2004 and report filed on SEDAR) the results of a scoping study by SRK Consulting that extended the SNC Lavalin Feasibility Study mine plan an additional 11 years by scheduling the potentially "mineable tonnes" resulting from the conversion of inferred resources based on historical data. SRK Consulting considered that Jacobina has the potential to deliver "economically mineable tonnes" containing 2 million recoverable ounces of gold and that the optimum production rate at Jacobina was likely 5,200 tonnes per day or 154,000 ounces of gold per year. While, it must be cautioned that the SRK study is not adequate to definitely confirm the economics of the inferred mineral resources, the 2004 drilling program has successfully upgraded a substantial amount of the existing inferred resource to the indicated category which can now form the basis for an expanded feasibility study. (www.desertsunmining.com).

Statements in this release that are not historical facts are "forward-looking statements" within the meaning of the U.S. Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Readers are cautioned that any such statements are not guarantees of future performance and that actual developments or results may vary materially from those in these "forward-looking statements".

Table 1: Significant Drilling Results, Northern Area, Bahia Gold Belt

Hole              From       To       Gold   Interval   True   Depth
No.(x)             (m)       (m)     (g/t)      (m)    Width   Below
                                                        (m)  Surface
                                                                (xx)
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Pindobacu (50km north of Jacobina)
PB 01         N8812051   E348976   El 597
dip -50 degrees/
az=270 degrees    1.00      1.40     0.70      0.40     0.3       1
                 14.75     20.55     0.54      5.80     3.7      13
                 98.55    101.60     7.20      3.05     2.0      81
                108.10    108.60     0.59      0.50     0.3      88
                113.58    115.35     0.43      1.77     1.1      91
                184.58    185.45     5.21      0.87     0.6     135
---------------------------------------------------------------------
PB 02         N8811930   E348930   El 628
dip -50 degrees/
az=270 degrees   43.48     67.77     5.46     24.29    21.9      35
           incl. 44.15     49.41    12.27      5.26     4.7      36
           incl. 61.63     67.77    10.22      6.14     5.5      55
                 86.40     87.40     2.05      1.00     0.9      79
---------------------------------------------------------------------
PB 03         N8811676   E348938   El 649
dip -50 degrees/
az=270 degrees   24.05     30.58     0.67      6.53     5.9      28
                 78.07    105.17     1.46     27.10    24.4      84
                145.00    146.90     1.03      1.90     1.7     134
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Fumaca (10 km north of Pindobacu)
FN 01        N 8824660  E 351374   El 545
dip -50 degrees/
az=275 degrees       No significant values
---------------------------------------------------------------------
FN 02A       N 8823700  E 351316   El 681
dip -60 degrees/
az=275 degrees   38.75     52.90     0.72     14.15    10.1      37
           incl. 38.75     41.90     1.95      3.15     2.2      37
                 65.10     66.10     0.59      1.00     0.7      62
---------------------------------------------------------------------
FN 03        N 8823801  E 351001   El 720
dip -50 degrees/
 az=275 degrees      No significant values
---------------------------------------------------------------------
FN 04        N 8824427  E 352062   El 541
dip -50 degrees/
az=275 degrees       Assays pending
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Sambura (10 km south of Pindobacu)
SB 01        N 8802260  E 345257   El 729
dip -50 degrees/
az=270 degrees       No significant values
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Biquinha (23 km south of Pindobacu)
BQ-01        N 8789101  E 341655   El 949
dip -50 degrees/
az=270 degrees       No significant values
---------------------------------------------------------------------
Serra do Corrego Extension (10 km north of Jacobina)
CA-01        N 8774422  E 335664   El 607
dip -50 degrees/
az=270 degrees       No significant values
---------------------------------------------------------------------

(x) all holes are NQ diamond drill core size and have been
    drilled + perpendicular to the north-south strike of the zones.
(xx) depth calculated based on midpoint of intersection

To view "FIGURE 1: GEOLOGY OF BAHIA GOLD BELT AND LOCATIONS OF TARGET AREAS DRILLED", please click the following link: http://www2.cdn-news.com/database/fax/2000/dsm0119a.doc

To view "FIGURE 2: GEOLOGY AND MINERALIZATION OF THE PINDOBACU AREA SHOWING LOCATIONS OF RECENT DIAMOND DRILLING", please click the following link: http://www2.cdn-news.com/database/fax/2000/dsm0119b.doc

Desert Sun Mining Corp. (TSX:DSM) (AMEX:DEZ)