US ambassador defends Freeport against charges of HR and environmen (fwd)

["M.G.G. Pillai" <pillai@mgg.pc.my>]

---------- Forwarded message ----------
Date: 05 Mar 2000 03:43:19
From: tapol@gn.apc.org
Reply-To: "Conference act.indonesia" <indonesia-act@igc.org>
To: Recipients of indonesia-act <indonesia-act@igc.org>
Subject: US ambassador defends Freeport against charges of HR and  environmen

From: TAPOL <tapol@gn.apc.org>
Subject: US ambassador defends Freeport against charges of HR and  environmental abuses

Republika, 4 March 2000
[Slightly abridged] 

US government has investigated charges against Freeport re human rights and
environmental abuses
 
Jakarta, 

The US ambassador to Jakarta, Robert Gilbard, has denied charges against PT
Freeport that it committed human rights abuses and damaged the environment.
He said that the military should be investigated, not Freeport as a company. 

Speaking at a press briefing on Friday, the ambassador  said that the US
government had itself undertaken investigations of the charges levelled
against Freeport because the charges had resulted in threats to revise the
contract of work with the company.

'Our investigations showed that the charges were unproven,' said Gilbard,
who was accompanied at the press briefing by Thomas R. Pickerking, a senior
State Department official who has been on a three-day visit to Indonesia.
 
 The ambassador said that as far as human rights abuses were concerned.,
the Indonesian government should investigate the Indonesian military. 'Any
charges levelled against Freeport are clearly unproven,' he said.

If it was a question of the military using Freeport facilities when
violating human rights, the ambassador said that this was difficult to
avoid. If the military ask to borrow things from Freeport, it is difficult
for the company to refuse
 
Pickering said that the Indonesian government would respect all contracts
that it had signed. Contracts are integral to the confidence to invest and
investment is integral to the economic advance of a country.

The official spokesperson of the TNI, Vice Air Mrshal Graito Usodo, said
separately that he had not himself heard the charges being made by the US
ambassador. If he said such things, this would have to be proven and
properly evaluated. 'He cant put forward a one-sided view of the matter,'
he said. Graito Usodo pointed out further that the TNI was present in the
area precisely in order to protect a vital enterprise.  'The troops are
there,' he said, 'to provide security so that the employees of Freeport can
continue with their productive activities without fear.'
       
 
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TAPOL, the Indonesia Human Rights Campaign
111 Northwood Road, Thornton Heath,
Surrey CR7 8HW, UK
Phone: 0181 771-2904   Fax: 0181 653-0322
email: tapol@gn.apc.org
Internet: www.gn.apc.org/tapol
Campaigning to expose human rights violations in
Indonesia, East Timor, West Papua and Aceh

26 years - and still going strong 
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