Australia?s Oropa acquires N. Sumatra gold, copper project

Australian mining firm Oropa Limited announced on Monday that its wholly owned subsidiary, Excelsior Resources Limited had reached agreement in principle to the terms and conditions of an Option to Purchase Agreement with Sons of Gwalia Limited and Western Metals Copper Limited, the vendors of the Pungkut gold project, located in North Sumatra.

The agreement will give Excelsior option to acquire a 75 percent beneficial interest in Pungkut project. The parties expect to execute the Agreement as soon as practical after the resumption of normal business activities in early January 2003.

The acquisition will give Oropa 75 percent stake in PT. Sorikmas Mining, the Pungkut project operator. State miner PT. Aneka Tambang, Tbk. holds the remaining 25 percent stake in Sorikmas Mining.

Pungkut is located some 70 km south of Newmont's large Martabe gold project near the west coast in North Sumatra, which currently hosts an inferred gold resource of approximately 2.2 million ounces, with expectations to substantially increase this resource. The area is prospective for large deposits of gold, copper-gold-molybdenum and zinc-lead.

Exploration in Pungkut commenced in March 1995. Systematic regional geo-chemical sampling from some 2,700 sample sites was completed over the original CoW area, with many gold, copper, molybdenum, lead and zinc anomalies being defined. Some of these anomalies have been followed up by extensive geophysical and geo-chemical surveys and initial diamond drilling at two primary prospects, Sihayo, which is sediment hosted and the Mandagang porphyry copper prospect. No systematic fieldwork has been undertaken in Pungkut since mid-1999. (alex)