Court puts Rio Tinto, BP assets in sequestration
Friday, March 15 2002 - 05:05 PM WIB
The sources said sequestration orders were delivered to BP and Rio Tinto?s Jakarta offices on Thursday.
Rio Tinto?s spokesperson Nunik Maulana confirmed that the South Jakarta district court had issued the ruling but she did not provide detail about the assets that had been put into sequestration.
?All I can say now is the sequestration doesn?t include KPC mining operation assets. Therefore KPC?s operations is unaffected by the decision,? she said.
Sources said that the sequestration order had been put to Rio Tinto's assets in Kelian Equatorial Mining and Freeport Indonesia, where the company is shareholder.
The court decision makes KPC divestment scheme becomes more complicated and could pose as stumbling block that prolong the negotiation deadlock, said the sources.
Last year, the provincial government of East Kalimantan through its business subsidiary had filed lawsuit against KPC shareholders and several parties it considered hindering KPC?s divestment process and accused that divestment delay had caused economic loss for East Kalimantan government, which considered itself as firm buyer of KPC shares.
Last week, the government and KPC shareholders had agreed to value 100 percent of KPC shares at US$822 million. East Kalimantan demanded to be given first priority to buy the shares but thus far KPC shareholders had insisted that every Indonesian owned business entity had equal right to purchase the shares.
KPC earlier said that the company will proceed with its divestment offer as soon as it is ?freed from all legal action related to KPC?s share divestment in Indonesia?.
KPC, which operates giant coalmining in East Kalimantan, is required to divest 51 percent of its shares this year. (alex/godang)