Tethyan Copper Company (TCC) has sent a letter to the government, informing it that the company has filed a request for arbitration in a dispute over the Reko Diq project at the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes in Washington DC.
Through the letter, TCC – a joint venture between Chilean copper producer Antofagasta and Canada’s Barrick Gold – has told the finance ministry, the interior ministry and the Board of Investment chairman that it has taken Pakistan to the international court for seeking damages.
TCC, which owns the massive Reko Diq project in Balochistan with reserves estimated at 2.2 billion tons of gold and copper, opted for arbitration after the Balochistan government turned down its application for a mining lease on November 16 last year.
On May 5, 2011, the Supreme Court had allowed the Balochistan government “to expeditiously decide Tethyan’s application for granting a mining lease and submit a report”.
As the court had been keeping the case pending since May 5, a petitioner insisted that it should be taken up as early as possible for countering TCC’s attempts to start arbitration proceedings and claim millions of dollars in damages.
“It is necessary that the court declares illegal the (earlier) agreement between the Balochistan government and Tethyan Copper Company,” said an application filed by members of Jamaat-i-Islami and the Workers Party through their lawyer Raza Kazim.
Kazim told the court that TCC wanted to avoid Pakistani law and the authority of judiciary. He feared that the international arbitration tribunal would have no option but to give a decision in favour of TCC, which could lead to claims of billions of dollars in damages.
Published in The Express Tribune, January 15th, 2012.
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Tethylane should go to same court where khashmir issue and dams on indus river are being disputed.she would have edge in case.
The Baluchistan Mining Concession Rules, 2002 states the procedure to do mining business and other provinces have similar rules. Kindly note that there is no bidding process because there is NO DATA available with govt. If one believes that there is potential for a certain mineral then first step is to acquire a Reconnaissance Licence FOR A PARTICULAR AREA OF INTEREST after payment of prescribed fee. Then a Exploration Licence is acquired by paying fee again. The last step is to obtain a Mining Licence again after payment of fee. The fee for each licence and royalty are clearly stated in the Mining Rules. TCC was not here for a picnic party and spent a couple of hundred million dollars for business deal. They were very generous by agreeing to share 25% profits with Baluchistan Govt because the Mining Rules do not require profits to be shared. I AM GLAD THEY HAVE OPTED FOR THE LEGAL RECOURSE INSTEAD MAKING ILLEGAL PAYMENTS TO OUR HIGH OFFICIALS. No foreign investor or donor agency will now fund Reko project and as usual Pakistan will suffer by not getting a world class project going. NO FEE, NO ROYALTY, NO JOBS!!!
This is old news - a repeat of an article that is at least a month old.
One more example of why capital will not flow into PAK. It is a lawless nation. Once international aid is cut off PAK will look back at this period of time as when things were good.