A US$178 million expansion at Oxiana’s copper plant at Sepon in Laos will reduce cash costs by approximately 10%.

The expansion will enable the plant to process 80,000 tonnes of cathode copper per annum and it is expected to be completed by 2010. Orders have been placed for critical path items including CCD thickeners.

The second autoclave project, which will improve the reliability of the plant and throughput capability, is progressing well with early tie-in works completed. Detailed engineering is nearing completion, all long lead orders have been placed and autoclave progress inspections carried out. This project is on schedule to be completed in the first quarter of 2009.

Exploration activity continues at Sepon with surface programmes generating new targets and up to 19 drill rigs active. Resource drilling has concentrated on detailed resource evaluation at the Thengkham South deposit with several high grade copper results returned.

Resource models are being progressively updated and new estimates are expected to be completed shortly.

At Thengkham East, exploration drilling returned 5m at 2.8% copper and 26m at 1.4% (primary) copper in areas of low drilling density. These results highlight the potential for this style of mineralization in the Sepon district and immediate follow up drilling is planned.

Preliminary drilling at Songkham West intersected visible copper mineralization and rock chip samples from Boupha returned up to 4.9 grams/tonne gold and 0.44% copper, further upgrading the potential of this nearby prospects.

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