Jakarta – Hundreds of PT Freeport Indonesia workers have returned to work after a three-month strike, but a workers' union official predicts that it will take three or four weeks before all the company's thousands of employees will get back to work.

Head of the Mimika chapter of the All Indonesian Workers' Union (SPSI), Virgo Solossa, said Wednesday that some of the contractors and subcontractors insisted on imposing sanctions upon employees who went on strike, which was a violation against the agreement between PT Freeport and the SPSI.

Virgo, who used to be an executive of SPSI's unit at Freeport, urged the company's contractors and subcontractors to cooperate in the mobilization process of the workers, antaranews.com reported.

On Tuesday, PT Freeport's management sent six buses to collect its workers from Gorong-gorong terminal in Timika to Tembagapura. The company also provided six buses to transport the workers on Wednesday.

The workers were scheduled to return to work on Dec. 26 following the company's commitment to raise their salaries by 39 percent. However, the restart was delayed because one contractor, PT Kuala Pelabuhan Indonesia, wanted to impose sanctions against around 500 employees who had joined the strike.

PT KPI had formerly agreed not to take any action against them but subsequently, several other contractors and subcontractors refused to rehire workers who had been on strike.