PT Koba Tin’s smelting facilities on Indonesia’s Bangka island have been shut down, pending an investigation into illegal mining, the head of local police force said today. "We closed down Koba Tin’s smelting operation this morning. The company is not allowed to produce refined tin as evidence shows it has received tin ore from illegal mining," Djuhandani Raharjopuro, the head of Central Bangka police, told Reuters.
Last Thursday police arrested two miners and closed a small ore storage unit as part of an investigation into alleged illegal operations. Koba has denied allegations that any of its sub-contractors were involved in mining in a protected forest area. "All production from the company’s sub-contractors are from mining activities carried out within the company’s Contract of Work (COW) and outside forest areas," Ikhwansah, the company’s corporate secretary, told Reuters last week. No further comments have been made by the company today.
Since small-scale mining activity on Koba’s 41,000 hectare COW area resumed last August, all of the work has been done under new sub-contracting arrangements which the company closely monitors. However Koba’s 75% shareholder Malaysia Smelting Corporation reported in its third quarter results statement that production was being restricted as a result of the recent re-drawing of the provincial forest boundary which runs within its COW area.
Output has recently been running at around 1,000 tonnes per month from Koba’s own dredging and gravel pump mining and sub-contractor activities.
