Dealing in metal from Papua could break UK law because of environmental impact of mining it, campaigners argue

Campaigners have warned the world’s largest metals market, the London Metal Exchange (LME), that it could be breaking the law by allowing the trading of copper from one of the world’s most controversial mines.

The way the metal is produced at the Grasberg mine in the highlands of Papua, Indonesia, an ongoing conflict zone, is so environmentally destructive it would be illegal almost anywhere else in the world, they say. The mine’s operator, PT Freeport Indonesia (PTFI), strongly disputes those claims. [...]

The mine’s operator, PTFI PT Freeport Indonesia (PTFI), says it has “designed and constructed a system of levees to manage the deposition of what will ultimately be about 3bn tonnes of tailings” by the end of the mine’s life, in 2041.

People indigenous to Papua claim their communities have been racked with poverty, disease, oppression and environmental degradation since the mine began operations in 1973.

An analysis of the mine’s tailings waste published in 2020 found it contained contaminants including arsenic, cadmium, lead, mercury and cyanide, and a 2016 study in Nature found that the sheer volume of the waste was leading to “forest inundation and degradation of water bodies critical to Indigenous peoples”.

One tribal chief from the area said in 2016 that tailing sediment from the mine had raised the riverbed by his village, suffocating the fish, oysters and shrimp on which his people’s diet and economy are traditionally based.

PTFI told the Guardian that managing the tailings process safely and effectively was one of their top environmental priorities. “The tailings management system from the Grasberg mine has complied with the AMDAL (Environmental Impact Assessment), the Decree of the Minister of Environment, the Decree of the Governor, and the Permit of the Mimika Regent, and it has been operating for almost 30 years. We continue to demonstrate through external reviews that the system is the most environmentally sound approach for tailings management at Grasberg, given the site-specific conditions.

“We are committed to responsible production, integrating leading international environmental standards and technologies at all our operations, including Grasberg.”

On Monday, campaigners from the London Mining Network (LMN) and the Global Legal Action Network (GLAN) wrote to the LME and its regulator, the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA), to warn that trading copper produced at Grasberg could amount to money laundering.

They say that disposing of the mining waste in this way would constitute a serious offence if it took place in the UK, and so copper produced at the mine could be considered to be “criminal property” under the Proceeds of Crime Act (POCA).

“The London Metal Exchange is the world centre for metals and critical minerals trading,” said Stéphanie Caligara, a lawyer with GLAN.

“As humanity’s reliance on metals like copper intensifies in the pursuit of the ‘green transition’, the exchange has a legal duty to ensure that the metals traded on its exchange are not produced on the backs of environmental crimes." [...]