Churchill continues to battle Indonesia

By Romel S. Gurky

LSE-listed Churchill Mining PLC said on Tuesday that while it has enough funding resources to cover legal expenses to continue its legal battle against the Indonesian government over a coal asset dispute, the company plans to seek extra financial resources.

?The ICSID litigation is progressing and whilst the group is fully funded for more than 12 months?, additional funding will be needed in the form of a further equity raise and/or debt funding. The group remains fully committed to its ICSID litigation against the Republic of Indonesia,? Churchill said in a statement, adding that as end of last year, the company has cash funds of US$1.29 million.

C?hurchill filed in 2014 a lawsuit against with the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes (ICSID) against the government of Indonesia, which has been accused by the company of unlawfully revoking its mining license over the East Kutai coal project in East Kalimantan. The East Kutai coal project is Churchill?s only asset. The UK firm has sought for about $1.3 billion in compensation.

Churchill and its subsidiary own 75 percent of the East Kutai coal project, with the remainder held by its partner, Ridlatama Group.

The Indonesian government, however, has said that Churchill and Ridlatama never owned the coal asset as documents related to the licenses the companies were forged. The government said that the coal asset belongs to companies under the Nusantara Group.

According to Churchill, the East Kutai coal asset contains a JORC Resource of 2.8 billion tons and incorporated a JORC Reserve of 980 million tons.

Editing by Reiner Simanjuntak