Walhi demands KEM to rehabilitate environment

The high profile environmental watchdog Walhi demands gold mining firm PT Kelian Equatorial Mining (KEM) to rehabilitate the local environment once it ends its operation later this month.

Walhi spokesman Hening Parlan was quoted by the Neraca daily Thursday as saying that KEM had disposed its solid waste materials to the local Nakan River, and liquid waste to the Kelian river.

Hening said that the KEM operation had seriously affected the local environment.

The paper said that KEM, which is controlled by the Rio Tinto mining giant, will end its operation in West Kutai, East Kalimantan, with no possibility of its contract being renewed because the gold reserves had been depleted.

KEM has a production capacity of around 23,000 tons of ore per day.

Elsewhere, Hening also called on KEM to resolve the various social problems including those related to land dispute and human rights violation.

?In addition to the ecology (problem), there are human rights problem and land annexation which until now has not been resolved.?(*)