Mr. Darcy Marud reports

WESTERN EXPLORATION INITIATES DRILL PROGRAM AT DOBY GEORGE

Preparation work has begun for a drill program at Western Exploration Inc.'s 100-per-cent-owned Doby George gold project, located within the Aura district in northeastern Nevada. Site preparation is under way and the drill is scheduled to arrive during the week of July 27, 2026. The drill holes will support baseline studies and a prefeasibility study (PFS) in respect of the Doby George project.

The program is designed to target up to 3,000 metres across 15 drill holes. The drill holes being completed will serve as infill drilling aimed at converting mineral resources from the inferred to indicated category in the next resource estimate and will support additional column leach test work, mineralized material and waste rock geochemical characterization and hydrogeological test work.

The hydrogeological (hydrology) test work and associated monitor wells will be used to characterize the site's water resources. This work is a key input to the company's PFS for the Doby George project. By prioritizing and completing this work, Western is sequencing its drilling so that the hydrogeological data are available when required, helping to advance the timeline for completing the necessary permitting requirements at the Doby George project.

The hydrogeological data and monitor wells will complement the baseline environmental studies already under way at the Doby George project, building the technical foundation needed to support the project's permitting and engineering workstreams. The program follows the company's 2025 preliminary economic assessment (PEA), which outlined a near-surface, open-pit, heap-leach operation at the Doby George project. See below under the heading "Scientific and technical information."

On July 7, 2026, Western hosted a multiagency site visit, led by the U.S. Forest Service (the agency). Agency representatives reviewed the proposed project layout on the ground and discussed the scope of work ahead. Feedback received during the visit is being incorporated into the company's mine plan of operations (MPO) for the Doby George project, supporting a submission that reflects agency input from the outset. The company expects to submit the MPO by early August, 2026.

The feasibility study being completed by Raft River Rural Electric Co-operative with respect to the company's grid power, announced in June, 2026, is progressing as anticipated, with results expected in Q4 2026. The power study will form part of the PFS and support the long-term development of both the Doby George project and the company's Gravel Creek project.

Darcy Marud, president and chief executive officer of Western Exploration, commented: "We remain focused on advancing and completing all baseline studies and programs required to advance the Doby George project through permitting and development. Our consultants at Stantec Consulting, Kappes Cassiday & Associates, and Raft River Electric continue advancing their scopes of work. In addition, we were honoured to host a multiagency project site visit in early July and to discuss the project in an open and co-operative manner. The upcoming drill program is the next step in turning a strong economic study into a permittable, buildable project."

About Western Exploration Inc.

Western Exploration is a Nevada-focused gold and silver developer advancing its 100-per-cent-owned Aura project, located approximately 120 kilometres north of Elko, Nev. The Aura project hosts two primary assets: Doby George, a near-surface oxide heap-leach project with a positive 2025 preliminary economic assessment; and the Gravel Creek/Wood Gulch corridor, a high-grade gold-silver epithermal system. For more information, please refer to the PEA technical report. Western trades on the TSX Venture Exchange under the symbol WEX and on the OTCQX market under the symbol WEXPF.

Scientific and technical information

The scientific and technical information in this news release has been reviewed and approved by Mark Hawksworth, general manager of Western's Aura project, a qualified person within the meaning of National Instrument 43-101, Standards of Disclosure for Mineral Projects.

The PEA is preliminary in nature and includes inferred mineral resources that are considered too speculative geologically to have the economic considerations applied to them that would enable them to be categorized as mineral reserves, and there is no certainty that the PEA will be realized. Mineral resources that are not mineral reserves do not have demonstrated economic viability.

The PEA is more particularly described in the technical report entitled "Preliminary Economic Assessment of the Doby George Deposits and Updated Resource Estimate for the Gravel Creek Gold-Silver Deposits, Aura Gold-Silver Project, Elko County, Nevada," dated Oct. 1, 2025 (with an effective date of June 17, 2025), which was prepared for Western and is available on SEDAR+ under Western's issuer profile.

The PEA was prepared by independent representatives of KCA and Respec Company LLC, each of whom is a qualified person within the meaning of NI 43-101 and independent of Western for purposes of Section 1.5 of NI 43-101. At the effective date of the PEA, each qualified person certified that, to the best of his knowledge, information and belief, the parts of the PEA for which he was responsible contain all scientific and technical information required to be disclosed to make the PEA not misleading. The affiliation and areas of responsibility for each qualified person involved in preparing the PEA are provided below:

• Travis Manning, PE, of KCA -- processing design and costs, metallurgy, recovery, and cash flow;
• Michael S. Lindholm, CPG, of Respec -- geology, database and MRE;
• Kyle Murphy, PE, of RESPEC -- open-pit design, mine planning, scheduling and costing.

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