Canada-based gold explorer Golden Peaks Resources Ltd. has added a new project in its "strategic shift in focus to Indonesia" with the completion of its acquisition of Reliance Resources Ltd., the company said on Monday.

The company said it aims to be "part of the next wave of mining investment" in Indonesia, with prospects focused in the Southeast Asian archipelago's eastern region that it pointed out has seen most the country's mining activity in the past 15 years.

Golden Peaks said it now has five "highly diversified" gold projects-three on Sulawesi Island and two on Halmahera Island-covering 30,000 hectares in eastern Indonesia and a "foothold in a region that hosts some of the world's largest gold projects."

The projects, said the company, are close to operating gold mines or defined resources within similar geological settings such as Newcrest Mining's Gosowong Mine on Halmahera that reportedly has a resource of 5.1 million ounces of gold to date.

Of the five Golden Peaks projects, three have been drill tested. Of these, the Tanoyan mine on Sulawesi Island has undergone two phases of diamond drilling, with the most recent drilling resulting in "an initial NI 43-101 inferred resource of 2.22 million tonnes grading 1.3 g/t gold (91,100 ounces contained)," the company said.

"A previous resource estimate prepared in 2009, which is not compliant with NI 43-101 but compliant with Australian Joint Ore Reserves Committee (JORC) requirements, placed the resource at 270,500 ounces of gold," the company said.