World's Largest Gold Mine Halts Production
Posted on: Wednesday, 22 February 2006, 00:00 CST
JAKARTA, Indonesia - Production at the world's largest gold and copper mine was suspended Wednesday after illegal miners blocked the road leading to the site in Indonesia's remote Papua province, a company spokesman said.
Around 400 illegal miners set up wood and stone barricades on the road leading to the Grasberg mine in Indonesia's Papua province, which is run by a local unit of New Orleans-based Freeport-McMoRan Copper & Gold Inc, said police spokesman Kartono Wangsadisastra.
"Mining and milling operations have been temporarily suspended as a precautionary measure," said Freeport spokesman Siddharta Moersjid in Jakarta. "The Indonesian authorities are working to resolve the situation in a peaceful and expeditious manner."
The last time the mine closed down was in 2003 after a landslide killed several workers.
The protest followed clashes Tuesday after police and company security guards tried to disperse the miners, who earn their living retrieving gold from waste rock dumped by the mine, said Wangsadisastra.
Three Freeport employees, one policeman and two illegal miners received minor injuries in the clash, said Moersjid.
The mine in the remote province has long had an uneasy relationship with local people, most of whom are desperately poor. Papua is also home to a separatist rebellion, complicating Freeport's security still farther.
Security practices at the site have came under renewed scrutiny since a 2002 attack on a convoy of teachers working at the mine killed two U.S. citizens. Local and foreign rights groups claim soldiers took part in the attack, allegedly to extort more security payments money from Freeport.
Source: Associated Press/AP Online
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