Mr. Edward Yew reports

HIGHLAND CRITICAL MINERALS CORP. PROVIDES OPERATIONAL UPDATE

Highland Critical Minerals Corp. has engaged a third party geologist to design and evaluate an exploration program in the Red Lake gold camp located in the Red Lake gold district of Ontario. As previously announced on July 11, 2025, the company, through its wholly owned subsidiary Highland Red Lake Gold Corp., entered into an option agreement to earn a 100-per-cent interest in mining claims on the Red Lake gold camp, comprising 3,366 hectares of mining claims.

The company expects Highland Red Lake's expanded summer exploration program to include an additional $150,000 in exploration expenditures focused on the Red Lake gold camp. It is anticipated that the exploration work would be focused on demonstrating lode gold potential through mapping, prospecting and rock sampling, airborne magnetics, and soil survey locations to evaluate till covered terrain for the lode gold structure relationships. The company expects the work to begin by the end of the month, with the objective to complete the program before year-end.

This expanded summer exploration project on the Red Lake gold camp is in addition to the previously announced summer lithium exploration on the company's Church property in the Quetico district of Ontario, Canada, consisting of a mobile metal ions soil sampling program designed to identify lithium anomalies on areas of the Church property where field crews have established there is no exposed bedrock. The Church property is strategically located in a lithium-rich area, surrounded by high-grade pegmatite projects, with significant infrastructure to support exploration and development.

Ted Yew, director and chief executive officer of Highland, commented: "We are extremely pleased with our most recent developments including the acquisition of the Sy property located in the Yathkyed Lake greenstone belt in Nunavut, Canada, and the completion of the option agreement in the Red Lake gold camp, reportedly one of the most prolific gold districts in the world. With these two new highly prospective gold properties located in two established gold production areas of Canada we are hopeful that continued exploration work would result in future gold discoveries. In the meantime, our exploration program at the Church property continues and we are looking forward to providing further updates in the upcoming weeks."

About Highland Critical Minerals Corp.

Highland is a mineral exploration and development company. Its activities consist of acquiring and exploring, mining properties to enhance shareholder value as it proceeds with the exploration work on the Church property among other mining properties it may acquire and develop.

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