Conference Proceedings
2002 AusIMM New Zealand Branch Annual Conference - 150 Years of Mining
Conference Proceedings
2002 AusIMM New Zealand Branch Annual Conference - 150 Years of Mining
New Perspectives on the Busang Gold Fraud
The gold salting fraud at Busang on the island of Kalimantan, Indonesia was exposed in early 1997 and resulted from the independent drilling, sampling and assaying of PT Freeport Indonesia which reported assays from the South East Zone with negligible concentrations of gold. Since then, a number of legal actions directed at former Bre-X directors, consulting firms and financial or broking institutions are at various stages and are based on numerous allegations surrounding the supposed existence of obvious and numerous warning signs or red flags'. These include: the absence of references to visible gold in the drill logs; the alluvial nature of the gold grains; the high gravity recoveries; the invalid comparison with Kelian; the absence of outside scrutiny and the lack of external review/audit and surface depletion of gold. The focus on the red flags has been at the expense of the numerous positive indications or green flags'. These include the morphology and chemistry of the gold grains, the gravity testwork, the amalgamation results, the role of external consultants, the results of a review by one of North America's leading minerals auditing groups, the behaviour of the gold at surface and the presence of references to visible gold in the drill logs. The flawed nature of the discussion of the technical facts surrounding Busang has prevented a meaningful and informed discussion about what actually happened and has, therefore, prevented the formulation of meaningful remedies for the future.
Contributor(s):
P L Hellman
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- Published: 2002
- PDF Size: 0.142 Mb.
- Unique ID: P200206040