One body found at Freeport mine

The body of one of the six persons who were missing in a landslide at PT Freeport Indonesia’s copper and gold mining site in Papua was found by the search and rescue (SAR) team, Kompas newspaper reported on Friday

Freeport’s senior manager for corporate communication Sidarta Moersjid told Kompas through telephone on Thursday that the body was identified as Suwardji's, a bulldozer operator from Blitar, East Java.

“ The team (SAR) had found his truck on last Saturday evening, his body during the night and the body was brought immediately to Timika. His body was sent to Blitar on Sunday morning and was handed over to his family members,” Sidarta said.

The mining operations were not resumed until Thursday as Freeport had been trying to stabilize the condition at the accident site for the sake of safety of the miners.

Freeport will fulfill all its obligations to pay the compensation to victims as per the company rules, Sidarta said.

The SAR team is still looking for the remaining missing victims – Fredrikus Tokan, Agus Quilem, J Fiani Bolung, Suradi and Warto.

Two persons were killed, six workers were missing and five others suffered injuries in the October’s landslide.

PT Freeport Indonesia is the unit of world mining giant New Orleans-based Freeport McMoRan Copper & Gold Inc. (*)