Australian Senator Bob Brown has
said he wants the country’s government “to clear the air on its role on behalf
of Rio Tinto”
in Mongolia “and also on if it influenced the Mongolian authorities to
legislate to overturn the super-profits (or windfall profits) tax.” In
reply to a question from Senator Brown last October on Mongolia”s tax debate,
Senator John Faulkner, representing Foreign Minister Stephen Smith, had said,
“The Australian government has made representations to the Mongolian
government that a stable regulatory environment is essential to attract foreign
investment.”

Brown’s fresh move comes after the Chairman of the Mongolian Green Party and
MP, D. Enkhbat, contacted him to express his concern that the presently
anticipated returns to the Mongolian Government from the Oyu Tolgoi and such
ventures will be inadequate for its social commitments, following the
withdrawal of the windfall profits tax. Senator Brown has said, “There was
a domestic campaign against the Oyu Tolgoi mine agreement. Clearly the
Australian government lobbied for Rio Tinto against those Mongolians — a
number of whom were arrested and jailed after peaceful protests.”