NIGER: FRENCH NUCLEAR GROUP’S LICENCE REVOKED AS RUSSIA INDICATED INTEREST IN URANIUM MINE

Sat 22  June 2024:

Niger’s military government has revoked the operating licence of French nuclear fuel producer Orano at one of the world’s biggest uranium mines, as it continues to cut ties with former colonial power France.

State-owned Orano said on Thursday that it had been ordered out of the Imouraren mine in northern Niger which sits on an estimated 200,000 tonnes of the metal, used for nuclear power and weapons.

Reporting from Abuja, Al Jazeera’s Ahmed Idris said the Nigerien Ministry of Mining had warned it would revoke Orano’s licence if development of the mine had not started by June 19.

Orano insisted in a statement on Thursday that it had recently resumed “activities” at the site, reopening “infrastructures” to accommodate “construction teams”, its work in line with the wishes of the government, which came to power in a coup in July last year.

Mining was meant to have started at Imouraren in 2015 but development was frozen after the collapse in world uranium prices in the wake of the 2011 Japanese disaster when a tsunami hit the Fukushima Daiichi Nuclear Power Plant in the northeast of the country.

Russian interest

The Nigerien government’s decision to revoke Orano’s licence may have wider geopolitical stakes. As Al Jazeera’s Idris noted, relations between Niger and its former colonial ruler took a “nosedive” after last year’s coup.

“The Nigerien government ordered the French ambassador to leave,” he said. “That was followed by the eviction of several hundreds of French soldiers based in Niger and the shutting down of all French bases in Niger.”

The government, which has increasingly turned to Russia and Iran for support, pledged to review foreign mining concessions in the country after it took power in July last year.

Now, said Idris, it seems it is targeting French businesses

“Russian companies have indicated interest in the uranium mining site in Imouraren and we’ve seen also a flurry of activities between Russian businesses and … Russian mercenaries in Niger, which could point to the direction where this new license …  may be headed to,” he added.