Ministry hopes key tribunal ruling in Churchill case next month
Tuesday, January 26 2016 - 03:49 AM WIB
The Ministry of Energy and Mineral Resources expects the International Centre for Settlement and Investment Dispute (ICSID) to make a key ruling next month in relation to lawsuit filed by LSE-listed Churchill Mining Plc.
Ministry Head of Legal Division, Heriyanto said on Monday that the government is still trying to prove that Churchill had engaged in falsifying license documents of the East Kutai coal project in East Kalimantan. He said that the tribunal is expected to make its ruling on this matter in February of this year. ?A ruling will be made in February in Singapore,? he said Monday.
He added that if Indonesia?s claims that Churchill has falsified documents are proven, the government will win the case.
Churchill and its subsidiary Planet Mining in 2014 filed a US$2 billion lawsuit with the tribunal against the Indonesian government following the revocation of the mining licenses of the East Kutai coal project in East Kalimantan, in which Churchill and Planet held a 75 percent interest, after the government of Indonesia via the East Kutai administration revoked the project.
The Indonesian Supreme Audit Agency (BPK) has said that five mining licenses in the claimed East Kutai project issued in 2006-2008 had been falsified.
Editing by Reiner Simanjuntak