http://www.auschron.com /current/pols.environs.html
Tribal Leader, Freeport Land in Court
Free Trip To New Orleans
by Robert Bryce
They were speaking two different languages. But more than that, it was a collision of two very different cultures.
Asking the questions in English was John Reynolds, a silver-haired attorney from Jones & Walker, one of New Orleans' largest law firms. On the witness stand, answering in Indonesian, was Tom Beanal, the soft-spoken leader of the Amungme tribe dressed in a plain white polo shirt and dark pants who was on his first visit to America. The two were in the Federal Courthouse in New Orleans last Friday for the latest hearing in the lawsuit known as Beanal v. Freeport McMoRan. The class action lawsuit, filed on April 29, seeks $6 billion in damages from Freeport for environmental and human rights problems that have been linked to the company's huge gold, copper, and silver mine in Irian Jaya, Indonesia.
At issue in the hearing was Beanal's lawyer, Martin E. Regan, Jr. Reynolds and Freeport were trying to persuade the judge in the case, U.S. District Court Judge Stanwood R. Duval, a Clinton appointee, to dismiss the case and issue sanctions against Regan because, they argued, Regan had not fully briefed Beanal about the issues in the lawsuit and had not shown Beanal the complaint before it was filed. They also argued that Regan had filed the suit on April 29 to distract Freeport's shareholders on the day before the company's annual meeting.
For his part, Regan insisted that under an April 25 contract signed by Beanal, he had the authority to file the complaint without showing it to his client. And Regan said the timing of the suit was due to Beanal's anger about full-page newspaper advertisements Freeport bought in New Orleans which claimed the company had reached a financial settlement with the Amungme and other tribes. Beanal and LEMASA, the Amungme tribal council, have both been quoted saying they did not approve any agreement with Freeport.
Regan and Reynolds argued the details surrounding the filing of the lawsuit for more than three hours. Regan, who was forced to take the witness stand to testify in his own defense, repeatedly discussed the difficulties he had in communicating with Beanal due to the poor infrastructure in Irian Jaya. And he frequently discussed the security situation in the region, saying that Beanal's life has been in danger ever since the suit was filed. Regan said he sent Beanal a copy of the complaint in English immediately after it was filed. But because Beanal's English is very limited, he could not understand the full text of the complaint until it was translated into Indonesian several weeks after it was filed.
Duval was clearly growing impatient with Regan when Beanal took the witness stand. Through an interpreter, Duval asked Beanal if he had authorized Regan to file the suit. "Yes," said Beanal. "And did you want Regan to file suit as quickly as possible after filing the letter of engagement on April 25?" "Yes," Beanal answered, "I wanted him to do it very quickly."
When Duval finished, Reynolds began questioning Beanal about statements he made in a deposition taken May 12 and 13 in Jakarta. Reynolds tried to get Beanal to admit that he didn't know what the suit alleged. Beanal said, "I am a person ignorant of the law. There are many meanings to the words in the law. It might take many times before I understand the meanings." Reynolds also referred to a May 1 letter in which Beanal had apparently canceled Regan's authority to work on his behalf. The letter was cited in several news reports that came out of the region during the first week in May. Reynolds said the letter proved Beanal did not know what was in the suit.
Again referring to the deposition, Reynolds said "You stated to me under oath that no one had given you an Indonesian translation of the complaint. You didn't know what the allegations said?" he asked.
Beanal, speaking softly with his head bowed slightly forward, responded, "I don't want to pull the suit back. I want to keep going with the suit. I want some changes, but I want to continue." He added that under his agreement with Regan, "He [Regan] can do what he thinks is right and we can talk about it after. Through this way of working, eventually we can meet and work things out."
Reynolds then took up the security issue. "From the filing of the suit on April 29 through the time of the deposition, you said you had no fear in Indonesia." Beanal replied, "I'm not afraid to defend the truth in court. But in my country, the truth is something to be struggled with." He continued, "I think it is appropriate to proceed here because it's an American company and the [Indonesian] government has an interest in the mine."
Reynolds then asked Beanal "Are you afraid?" Beanal answered, "Why am I afraid?" Reynolds: "Your lawyer has said you are afraid." Beanal: "I feel with the situation in Timika, anyone would be afraid."
Reynolds finished his arguments by asking Duval to dismiss the case "without prejudice." Reynolds said, "It is incumbent on the court to dismiss it. And to make sure that Mr. Beanal is given counsel and has the time to understand it." Regan countered, saying that Beanal's "statements to the court today say it all. He wants to go forward with the suit. He agrees with the suit and he wants to go forward."
The adversarial nature of the courtroom limited Beanal's statements. But the night before the hearing, during a talk at Loyola University, Beanal discussed Freeport's gold mine and its affect on his tribe. "They take our land and our grandparents' land. They ruined the mountains which are the head of our mother without any hesitation. They ruined our environment by putting the waste in the river. We can't drink our water any more." Again speaking through an interpreter, Beanal asked the crowd of about 50, which included two television and three newspaper reporters, "From all the mining, what do we get? Humiliation. Torture. Hostages. Killing. They ask us to leave our land. They've taken away our tradition and our culture. We've become alienated in our own land."
Beanal said his tribe has been working to address the situation for a long time. "During the last 30 years, we tried to find justice, but we never found it. And now comes Mr. Martin [Regan] and I can see justice. I come here to ask for justice."
After the hearing, Freeport spokesman Garland Robinette said the hearing was only to determine if Beanal's complaint was legitimate, and that the merits of the lawsuit would be discussed at a later time. Judge Duval asked both sides in the case to file memos on Freeport's motion by Friday, May 31. A decision should come some time in early June.
To see the complaint in Beanal vs. Freeport, visit Robert Boyer's Web page. An original member of the Freeport Seven, Boyer maintains the best source for information about the ongoing saga of the world's largest gold mine. Go to http://www.cs.utexas.eud/use rs/boyer/fp2®
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