Jakarta – Hundreds of people have attacked and torched a mining camp run by a subsidiary of the US mining company Newmont on Indonesia's Sumbawa island.

The attack came days after deadly clashes in Indonesia's Papua province during protests to demand the closure of another gold and copper mine run by the US firm Freeport-McMoRan.

"The attack took place on Sunday morning but we had already evacuated the base camp the previous day and temporarily halted our explorations there," a Newmont spokesman, Kasan Mulyono, said yesterday.

He said the company, Newmont Nusa Tenggara, received reports of the planned attack on the camp, where the company is exploring possible mine sites, and had evacuated its 135 workers.

Mr Mulyono said he was told hundreds of people had attacked the camp in the jungle east of the company's main mining site in Batu Hijau, destroying and then setting fire to buildings.

"From our air reconnaissance flights we estimate about 80 per cent of the buildings in the camp, all semi-permanent buildings, were destroyed." He had no details about who conducted the attack or the reasons behind it.

Sumbawa's district police chief, Abdul Hakim, said three people were arrested after the attack, which he said involved up to 500 people.

The paper said villagers had blockaded a road leading to the mine a week earlier, demanding they be involved in the company's exploration operations. Residents also wanted the company to pay money into a community development fund.

In Papua, Freeport-McMoRan pays 1 per cent of its profits into a fund controlled by local tribespeople. Another Newmont subsidiary, Newmont Minahasa Raya, has been accused in court of polluting a bay near its mine in North Sulawesi province.