OK TEDI MINE

Inmet Mining announced that the National Executive Council of the Government of Papua New Guinea has given its consent to the previously announced exchange of Inmet’s 18% equity interest in Ok Tedi Mining Limited for a 5% net smelter return (NSR) royalty on revenues of product from the Ok Tedi mine

Inmet Mining Corporation announced that it has reached an understanding to exchange its 18 percent equity interest in Ok Tedi Mining Limited (OTML) for a 5 percent net smelter return (NSR) royalty on revenues of product from the Ok Tedi mine.

Inmet reported OK Tedi Mine operation results for the quarter ended Mar31/09. The mine plan this quarter was modified to limit the amount of sulphur in tailings while the tailings management plant is being fully commissioned. The purpose of the plant is to minimize discharge of sulphur to the river, thus greatly reducing the potential environmental impact. Until the plant reaches its design performance, Ok Tedi will only mine ores with low sulphur content. The change in plan reduced gold grades but increased copper grades from what we expected. Mill throughput in the quarter was higher than last year, but lower than expected because of lower mine production and low grinding rates on certain ores. Gold recoveries were low because of difficulty with complex ores. The cost per tonne of ore milled this quarter was higher than in 2008 mainly because of the weaker value of the Canadian dollar. Ok Tedi expects to process 25.3 million tonnes of ore containing 0.8 percent copper and 1.1 grams per tonne of gold. This should produce 176,000 tonnes of copper and 608,000 ounces of gold. Copper grades should be slightly lower during the rest of the year, but gold grades should be slightly higher.