Bayan files appeal over Singapore commercial court ruling

By Romel S. Gurky

IDX-listed coal miner PT Bayan Resources Tbk said it had filed an appeal on Thursday with the Singapore Court of Appeal over a July 25 second tranche ruling of the Singapore International Commercial Court (SICC) in relation to its legal dispute with BCBC Singapore Pte Ltd. (BCBCS)

Bayan said in a statement on Friday that it is confident that the legal dispute would not have significant impact on the company?s mining operations.

As has been previously reported, Bayan and BCBCS, a subsidiary of ASX-listed White Energy Company Ltd (WEC), has been engaged in a legal dispute over a joint venture coal upgrading plant project, located at Bayan?s mine in Tabang, East Kalimantan Province.

WEC through subsidiaries BCBCS and Binderless Coal Briquetting Company Pty Ltd (BCBC) filed lawsuit against Bayan and its subsidiary Bayan International Pte Ltd, accusing the coal miner among others of breaching coal supply obligation to the joint venture, called PT Kaltim Supracoal, in which WEC holds 51 percent interest.

WEC said previously that the SICC had on July 25 ruled in favor of the company in a second tranche trial against Bayan. The second tranche of the trial was heard by the SICC in January 2017.

?The company is pleased to announce that the SICC found in favor of BCBCS and BCBC on substantially all of the issues heard by the SICC. In short, the SICC has found that Bayan was in breach of its coal supply obligation and had further repudiated the joint venture,? WEC said in a statement.

The company said a third tranche of the trial will be required to determine issues of causation and damage. The court released in April of last year its judgement in relation to the first tranche of the trial among others dismissing the counterclaims brought by Bayan, WEC said.

Editing by Reiner Simanjuntak