Arun NGL, KPC admit giving small amounts of fund to military, police troops

Liquefied natural gas producer PT Arun NGL Co and coalminer PT Kaltim Prima Coal (KPC) admitted that they had provided financial assistance for military and police troops posted in their areas of operation, but the assistance amounts were quite small, Tempo News Room website reported.

Arun NGL?s spokesperson Irwandar said that soldiers assigned to protect the company?s projects in Aceh had received only pocket money from it. ?The amount is quite small,? he said without elaborating.

KPC?s spokesperson Nunik Maulana said that it had provided funds to the police for the protection of its project sites, and that the funds were for their logistics only.

KPC, equally owned by world mining and energy giants Rio Tinto and BP PLC, operates a huge coalmine in Sangatta, East Kalimantan.

Meanwhile, the spokesman of Iskandar Muda military command supervising Aceh, Lt Col CHB Firdaus, said troops guarding Arun NGL?s area of operation had only received pocket money from it.

Firdaus said that soldiers posted in Arun and other parts of Aceh received more than Rp500,000 (US$=Rp9,000) monthly from TNI. ?But, those stationed at Arun NGL received additional pocket money from it. I don?t know how much,? he said.

TNI recently denied reports that U.S. copper and gold miner Freeport-McMoran Copper & Gold Inc had paid it about $5.6 million last year to protect workers and its projects in Papua province.

TNI Commander Gen Endriartono Sutarto said that soldiers stationed at Freeport?s area of operation in Mimika, Papua had received only ?meal allowance and pocket money? from PT Freeport Indonesia, the Indonesian unit of Freeport-McMoran which operates a huge copper and gold mine in Mimika.

On Monday, Army Chief Gen Ryamizard Ryacudu said troops tasked with protecting Freeport?s projects in Mimika received from TNI Rp125,000 monthly, not including meal allowance.

AFX Global Ethics Monitor, a news service from AFP, reported recently that Freeport-McMoran had disclosed the $5.6 million payment in a confidential document sent to the New York City comptroller?s office and to the US Securities and Exchange Commission.

In response to the report, PT Freeport Indonesia issued a press statement that over the past several years it had funded approximately $35 million of costs of the construction of houses, offices, barracks and other facilities for army troops at its projects in Mimika. (*)