According to John Kabey, the chairman of KADIN, Indonesia’s Trade and Industry Chamber, Freeport uses all its corporate social responsibility funds for its own security needs.

‘They use it all to finance infrastructure for the security of their operations, including payments to the Indonesian armed forces,’ he said.

He was speaking to a group of Indonesian ministers to report on the results of a KADIN seminar.

He used the same occasion to declare that  Freeport operations in Papua for the past more than thirty yeara have nothing to improve the living conditions of the  Papuan people. He said that Freeport operations have only led to  friction and conflict between the  Papuan people because  the various clans with rights to the land used by Freeport are still in onflict with each other.

Kabey said that the central government should not use Freeport as an economic resource, in particular because the financial benefits from the company all flow to the central government while those living in the vicinity of the company enjoy none of the benefits.

[COMMENT: The copper and gold reserves currently being mined by Freeport are deemed to be the largest reserves in the world, while Freeport’s operations have transformed a huge mountain into a deep crater and tailings have poisoned the nearby rivers, depriving Papuans who once lived in the area of the basic source of their livelihoods. TAPOL]