AVN 46.95 Increased By ▲ 0.30 (0.64%)
BAFL 28.60 Increased By ▲ 0.10 (0.35%)
BOP 3.73 Increased By ▲ 0.02 (0.54%)
CNERGY 3.15 Increased By ▲ 0.02 (0.64%)
DFML 10.92 Increased By ▲ 0.23 (2.15%)
DGKC 52.60 Decreased By ▼ -1.09 (-2.03%)
EPCL 42.86 Increased By ▲ 0.31 (0.73%)
FCCL 12.05 Decreased By ▼ -0.08 (-0.66%)
FFL 5.99 Increased By ▲ 0.06 (1.01%)
FLYNG 5.93 Decreased By ▼ -0.06 (-1%)
GGL 9.99 Increased By ▲ 0.09 (0.91%)
HUBC 68.60 No Change ▼ 0.00 (0%)
HUMNL 5.70 Increased By ▲ 0.05 (0.88%)
KAPCO 22.06 Increased By ▲ 0.16 (0.73%)
KEL 1.76 Decreased By ▼ -0.02 (-1.12%)
LOTCHEM 29.35 Increased By ▲ 0.95 (3.35%)
MLCF 28.31 Decreased By ▼ -0.14 (-0.49%)
NETSOL 73.50 Increased By ▲ 1.10 (1.52%)
OGDC 76.91 Increased By ▲ 1.41 (1.87%)
PAEL 9.25 Increased By ▲ 0.05 (0.54%)
PIBTL 4.20 Decreased By ▼ -0.04 (-0.94%)
PPL 59.35 Increased By ▲ 1.34 (2.31%)
PRL 14.25 Increased By ▲ 0.17 (1.21%)
SILK 1.11 No Change ▼ 0.00 (0%)
SNGP 42.49 Increased By ▲ 1.74 (4.27%)
TELE 6.65 Increased By ▲ 0.06 (0.91%)
TPLP 11.87 Increased By ▲ 0.17 (1.45%)
TRG 93.97 Increased By ▲ 0.17 (0.18%)
UNITY 12.99 Decreased By ▼ -0.04 (-0.31%)
WTL 1.18 Increased By ▲ 0.02 (1.72%)
BR100 4,145 Increased By 14.7 (0.36%)
BR30 14,190 Increased By 112.5 (0.8%)
KSE100 41,442 Increased By 89.2 (0.22%)
KSE30 14,708 Increased By 44.1 (0.3%)
Follow us

ISLAMABAD: The Economic Coordination Committee (ECC) of the Cabinet has approved a mark up payment of Rs6.238 billion on a short-term finance facility of Rs65 billion by the Finance Division from March 31, 2022, to December 30, 2022, for the Reko Diq project dispute settlement.

The meeting of the ECC presided over by Finance Minister Ishaq Dar was presented a summary by the Ministry of Energy that following 12 July 2019 award against the government of Pakistan by the Arbitral Tribunal of the International Centre for Settlement of Investment Disputes and in favour of M/s Tethyan Copper Company (Pvt) Limited, Australia (TCCA), the prime minister was constituted an apex committee in August 2019 which after multi-round, prolonged and extensive negotiations and deliberations between the Apex Committee and TCCA’s shareholders, framework of settlement and revival of the Reko-Diq Project was arrived at in March 2022.

The terms and conditions of the settlement, the ECC was told were that; (a) development of the Reko Diq copper-gold mineral resources under a reconstituted Reko Diq Project by a joint venture comprising - Barrick Gold Corporation (50 percent shareholding, GoB 25 per cent shareholding and PPL, OGDCL and Government GHPL, collectively holding 25 per cent share in the project.

Barrick Gold starts work on Reko Diq project

And payment of US$ 900.00 million along with interest payable at an annual rate equal to the US Prime Rate plus two percentage points compounded on monthly basis for the period from 1 July 2022 till 15 December 2022 to Antofagasta as consideration for the acquisition of its shares in the Reko Diq Project by SOEs and government of Balochistan (GoB).

The proposed settlement was ratified by the ECC and approved by the cabinet in March 2022 and as per the approved mechanism government of Pakistan (GOP) will provide the requisite share of funding on behalf of GoB through market financing, raised against the GHPL balance sheet in rupee terms backed by GoP guarantee, to be issued by Finance Division with approval of ECC of the Cabinet.

The ECC was informed that the short-term facility has expired on December 30, 2022 and the NBP has given notice for repayment of principal amount along with mark up payment and approached the Finance Division for renewal of this facility.

Accordingly, the Finance Division through GHPL arranged the Short-Term Finance facility of Rs65 billion from the National Bank of Pakistan on the balance sheet of GHPL with the GoP’s guarantee for funding of GoB’s share of US$ 137.5 million.

Since the final settlement proceedings were underway, the interest amount became due and as approved by the ECC and ratified by the federal cabinet an amount of US$ 12.716,368 for GoB’ s share towards interest payable to Antofagasta for the period up to December 15, 2022, was deposited in the designated Escrow Account from the said loan of Rs65 billion.

The ECC considered and approved a summary of the Ministry of Energy (Petroleum Division) regarding arrangement of Finance Facility for funding of Government of Balochistan’s share of obligation in Reko Diq project dispute settlement with directions to the Finance Division to arrange payment of mark-up amounting to Rs6,238,358,879 for the period from March 31, 2022, to December 30, 2022, to the NBP for the short term finance facility of Rs65 billion.

Copyright Business Recorder, 2023

Comments

1000 characters
Shakeelrehman Mar 28, 2023 11:10am
Ramzan help 10000 rs
thumb_up Recommended (0) reply Reply
test May 21, 2023 02:00pm
The gold belongs to the people of Balochistan Province of Paksitan and giving a portion of it to a foreign company just because Pakistan cannot pay back the 5 billion dollars fine is very very unfair. Hang all thosse till death who are involved in this deal. Simply hang all those till death and scrap the deal and instead just pay the 5 billion dollar fine that's it. It is better to give something to Chinese than to the jews and zionists because wherever jews and zionists go they bring destruction and only destruction and wherever Chinese go they bring prosperity. Chinese went to Malaysia, Indonesia, Vietnam, Phillipines and brought prosperity, development, infrastructure, investment and growth to the local people of those countries and wherever jewnited snakes of americans, or zionited snakes of americans or those in jewyork or their cronies in jewurope.
thumb_up Recommended (0) reply Reply

Reko Diq dispute: ECC approves Rs6.2bn mark-up payment

Oil jumps 2% on Saudi plan to deepen output cuts from July

Virtual pipeline LNG import terminal: Govt mulling granting tax exemptions

$5bn trade with Turkiye achievable in 3 years: PM

AEDB grants 6-month LoI extension to two wind IPPs

IK says will be tried in military court

Power supply to Balochistan and Sindh will improve: NTDC energises Guddu-Shikarpur transmission line

Roosevelt Hotel given to NYC govt for 3 years: govt

PIA starts direct Karachi-Skardu flights

Crackdown on tax defaulting vehicles to begin today

Saudi pledges big oil cuts in July as OPEC+ extends deal into 2024