A World Bank arbitration court has imposed 5.97 billion US Dollars penalty on Pakistan in a mining project case.

The Inter­national Centre for Settle­ment of Investment Disp­utes (ICSID) on Friday rendered its judgement against Pakistan in Reko Diq case.

Pakistan’s Dawn News reported that ICSID awarded a $4.08bn penalty and $1.87bn in interest.

The Tethyan Copper Company (TCC), a joint venture between Chile’s Antofagasta Plc and Canada’s Barrick Gold, had filed claims for international arbitration before the ICSID in 2012.

The company filed claims after the Balochistan government rejected a leasing request from the company, according to Dawn News.

The company said it had invested more than 220 million U.S. Dollars after discovering a vast mineral wealth more than a decade ago in Reko Diq, near Pakistan’s frontier with Iran and Afghanistan.

However, the officials of the company said the government of Pakistan unexpectedly refused to grant them the mining lease needed to keep operating.

Meanwhile, Tethyan board chair William Hayes has said in a statement the company was still “willing to strike a deal with Pakistan.”

However, he added that “it would continue protecting its commercial and legal interests until the dispute was over.”