Indonesia may issue new tax rules for mineral exports next week -official

JAKARTA, Jan 17 (Reuters) - Indonesia may issue new tax rules for mineral exports next week, a Finance Ministry official said on Tuesday, after discussions with the Energy and Mineral Resources Ministry, which recently changed rules on domestic mineral processing.

"We want the export duties to push domestic processing. That's the principle," Suahasil Nazara, head of the Fiscal Policy Office at the Finance Ministry, told reporters, adding that the taxes were "not just for increasing state revenues".

"There's a high possibility we will continue with a scheme that has layers, depending on completion of smelters," he added.

(Reporting by Hidayat Setiaji; Writing by Fergus Jensen; Editing by Kenneth Maxwell)