Strike still in talks over Berau coal project restructuring deal

Australian-firm Strike Resources said on Friday that it continued negotiations to restructure the Berau coal project co-operation agreement with its Indonesian partner PT Kaltim Jaya Bara (KJB) to address issues raised by Indonesia?s 2009 Mining Law.

The company said in its quarterly report that it has exhausted all reasonable efforts to resolve the dispute by negotiations and is likely to commence dispute resolution proceedings in the short term.

As previously announced, the position adopted by the company?s partner has raised uncertainty about whether negotiations will succeed.

Strike has recently completed an estimate of the Coal Resource in the Berau Project?s Nyapa West block to be 14 million tonnes (Mt), comprising 1.8 Mt of Measure Resource, 8.6 Mt of Indicated Resource and 3.6Mt of Inferred Resource. Within the Nyapa West block and the above Coal Resources estimates, 7.7 Mt.

Strike had also completed a Feasibility Study which focussed on the development of an open-cut contract mining operation with production scaling up from 1.5 Mt per annum (Mtpa) to 3Mtpa, with transportation 30kms by road to a new port for barging approximately 90kms down the Segah River to the coast and on to an established coal trans-shipment location approximately 30km offshore. (romel)