7th Sep 2020 06:55
(Alliance News) - US regulators are examining claims from a whistleblower that Rio Tinto PLC was aware of problems in Mongolia's Gobi Desert months before it revealed the project was running late and over budget, the Financial Times reported on Sunday.
The newspaper said the Securities & Exchange Commission is probing the allegations made by Richard Bowley, Rio's employee, who worked on the USD6.8 billion project between 2017 and 2019.
Bowley - a former head of strategic projects in Mongolia - said he first alerted Rio executives to issues at Oyu Tolgoi mine in Mongolia in February 2018, according to documents filed with a UK Employment Tribunal earlier this year.
Bowley left Rio in March 2019, with the miner, four months later, revealing the project was between USD1.2 billion and USD1.9 billion over budget and running 16 to 30 months behind schedule.
Citing people with knowledge of the situation, the FT said the SEC had not decided whether to launch an investigation.
https://www.ft.com/content/3537bf78-6aed-4588-9c15-5f14375f0f60?segmentId=bf7fa2fd-67ee-cdfa-8261-b2a3edbdf916
By Evelina Grecenko; [email protected]
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