JAKARTA (AFP)--U.S.-based mining giant Freeport McMoRan (FCX) is
paying Indonesian troops to protect a large gold and copper mine in
Papua, despite regulations requiring the military to hand over to
police.
The Arizona-based company said its local subsidiary paid "less
than" $1.6 million through wire transfers and checks in 2008 to
provide a "monthly allowance" to police and soldiers at and around
the Grasberg mine.
The disclosure, made in response to queries, means the company
continues to pay soldiers in contravention of a series of legal
measures aimed at stopping military units working as paid
protection, rights activists said.
Grasberg sits on the world's largest gold and copper reserves,
in a resource-rich but desperately poor region on the far eastern
extreme of the Indonesian archipelago.
Pro-independence Papuan militants have waged a long-running
insurgency against Indonesian rule in the province, and human
rights monitors say Freeport's payments help fund military abuses
against the local population.
The latest attempt to cut the military out of protection
payments - part of broader democratic reforms - came in a 2007
ministerial decree setting a six-month deadline for police to take
over security of "vital national objects."
The less-than-$1.6 million in direct payments are part of $8
million Freeport paid in broader "support costs" for 1,850 police
and soldiers protecting Grasberg last year, according to a company
report filed with the US Securities and Exchange Commission last
month.
While most of the direct payments go to the police-led Amole
task force at the mine, soldiers and police in surrounding areas
are also receiving payments, Freeport spokesman Bill Collier
said.
"Although the bulk of our support is directed to supporting the
Amole task force, we do provide some financial assistance to the
police and military who are assigned to the general area
surrounding our operations," Collier said.
A 2005 report by rights group Global Witness alleged Freeport
had paid hundreds of thousands of dollars directly to senior police
and military officers between 2001 and 2003.
The accusations are just one of many public relations headaches
for Freeport, the largest single taxpayer to the Indonesian
government.
Claims of rights abuses and environmental damage at the mine are
difficult to verify as Indonesia restricts travel by foreign
journalists to Papua and Freeport seldom allows media into its area
of operations.
Freeport's Collier did not say if the 2008 transfers included
large-scale payments - in cash or in kind - to senior officers. But
he said the company's actions were within the law.
However, Rafendi Djamin, coordinator of rights organization the
Human Rights Working Group, said the military payments were clearly
illegal although payments to police, while ethically questionable,
were permitted.
"The safest thing to say for sure is they (payments to the
military) are against the law. They are against government
regulations, ministerial as well as presidential decrees," Djamin
said.
Indonesian Energy and Mineral Resources Minister Purnomo
Yusgiantoro declined a request to be interviewed on the legality of
the payments.
Global Witness campaigner Diarmid O'Sullivan said Freeport's
disclosure of payments left unanswered questions over whether the
company is paying large sums to senior officers.
"Even now, the company still doesn't publish enough detail about
its security payments to clearly confirm that this practice has
stopped," O'Sullivan said.
Also unanswered is just how many soldiers are being paid.
Nyoman Suastra, the commander of the Amole task force officially
assigned to guard the mine, said there are 447 personnel in the
task force, which includes some soldiers.
Subtracting that number from the 1,850 police and military
personnel Freeport acknowledges it paid last year, it means the
company is paying 1,400 security personnel outside the mine, an
unspecified number of them soldiers.
"It is disturbing that Freeport still seems reluctant to answer
the most important questions, which are: who in the security forces
ends up with these allowances, how much money do they get and what
is the legal basis for these payments?" O'Sullivan said.