MINEX Forum

Website: Eurasia.com

  • European Parliament Calls for EU Ban on Alumina Exports to Russia

    European Parliament Calls for EU Ban on Alumina Exports to Russia

    The European Parliament has adopted a non-binding resolution urging the European Commission to impose sanctions on alumina exports to Russia, increasing political pressure on Brussels to tighten restrictions on trade linked to Moscow’s metals industry.

    The motion follows an investigation by The Irish Times and the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP), which found that Ireland’s Aughinish Alumina refinery has continued exporting substantial volumes of alumina to Russian smelters owned by Rusal. The resulting aluminium has reportedly been sold to Moscow-based trading company ASK, whose customer base includes more than 40 companies sanctioned by the European Union for their links to Russia’s defense sector.

    While investigators were unable to trace individual shipments of Irish alumina to specific military products because the material is blended during smelting, customs and trade data indicate that since 2023 more than half of Aughinish Alumina’s exports have been delivered to Russian smelters. Those facilities have subsequently sold more than $650 million worth of aluminium to ASK, which supplies companies associated with Russia’s military-industrial complex.

    The European Parliament’s resolution calls for stronger measures to limit Russia’s ability to finance its military operations in Ukraine. In addition to advocating a complete ban on alumina exports, lawmakers also supported proposals to blacklist Russian steel suppliers. Although the Parliament cannot impose sanctions itself, its position is expected to add pressure on the European Commission and EU member states, which must unanimously approve any new sanctions package.

    The Commission has so far refrained from restricting alumina exports because of Aughinish Alumina’s importance to European industrial supply chains. However, Irish Member of the European Parliament Barry Andrews argued that Irish alumina is highly likely to be contributing indirectly to Russia’s military production and called for immediate action if ongoing investigations confirm these links.

    The Irish government is completing its own investigation into Aughinish Alumina’s exports following the media reports. Prime Minister Micheál Martin said the findings will soon be submitted to the European Commission, while Enterprise Minister Peter Burke confirmed his department expects to finalize its report within days.

    Burke also rejected suggestions that Ireland had sought exemptions for Aughinish Alumina from EU sanctions, stating that the government has never lobbied on the company’s behalf and has not opposed any sanctions affecting its operations.

    The European Commission is expected to review the findings as it prepares its next package of sanctions against Russia.

  • Uzbekistan to Establish Project Office to Oversee Steel Industry and Scrap Metal Market

    Uzbekistan to Establish Project Office to Oversee Steel Industry and Scrap Metal Market

    Uzbekistan will establish a dedicated project office under the government to oversee the country’s ferrous metallurgy sector, President Shavkat Mirziyoyev announced during a meeting on the industry’s development.

    The new office is expected to begin operations within one month. In addition, an electronic platform, E-lom, will be launched at the beginning of August to monitor the circulation of ferrous metals across the country.

    The project office will conduct daily analysis of the steel market, compile data on supply and demand for raw materials and finished metal products, and maintain digital passports for metal products. Through the E-lom platform, all transactions involving ferrous metals will be tracked in real time.

    According to the government, the new measures are designed to promote fair competition, stabilize prices and strengthen oversight of the steel sector by increasing transparency throughout the supply chain.

    Officials also highlighted the importance of improving scrap metal collection. The Bekabad Metallurgical Plant currently produces around 40% of its rolled steel using recycled scrap, while the remaining 60% relies on imported raw materials. Each year, the plant receives approximately 700,000 tonnes of ferrous scrap, but an estimated additional 500,000 tonnes remains outside the formal market, circulating through the shadow economy.

    The government expects that tighter monitoring and digital tracking will help bring more scrap into the legal supply chain, reducing reliance on imports and improving raw material availability for domestic steel production.

  • Poland’s Coal Sector Loses PLN 300-400 Per Tonne as Output Falls to 42.8 Million Tonnes and Taxpayer Subsidy Reaches PLN 450,000 Per Job

    Poland’s Coal Sector Loses PLN 300-400 Per Tonne as Output Falls to 42.8 Million Tonnes and Taxpayer Subsidy Reaches PLN 450,000 Per Job

    Poland’s hard coal mining sector is generating losses of between PLN 300 and PLN 400 per tonne extracted, with average extraction costs running at approximately PLN 800 per tonne against a market value that does not exceed $100 — a structural deficit so deep that maintaining a single job in the loss-making segment of the industry costs Polish taxpayers approximately PLN 450,000 per year.

    Production has been on a consistent downward trajectory. Hard coal output fell to 42.8 million tonnes in 2025, 1.2 million tonnes below 2024 levels and a sharp decline from 52.8 million tonnes in 2022. Sales volumes of 43.2 million tonnes exceeded production in 2025, drawing down existing inventories. Domestic consumption of thermal hard coal stood at 37.8 million tonnes last year, with imports falling 26% to 3 million tonnes as domestic output remained sufficient to cover most needs.

    Despite the economic losses and declining output, coal remains indispensable to Poland’s electricity system. It accounted for more than 52% of electricity generation in 2025 — a share that fell by only 3 percentage points year-on-year. Renewable energy’s share of the energy mix grew by 0.7 percentage points to 31.4%, according to a report by Forum Energii, but the pace of transition remains insufficient to displace coal as the primary generation source in the near term.

    The paradox facing Polish energy policy is stark: the sector is economically unviable at current coal prices, yet without it the country would face immediate electricity supply deficits. The cost of maintaining jobs in loss-making mines exceeds what it would cost simply to pay miners their salaries without requiring them to extract coal — yet abrupt closure would threaten grid stability in a country still more than half dependent on thermal coal for power generation.

  • Euro Manganese Converts $23.5 Million Orion Debt to Royalty at Czech Chvaletice Project to Simplify Capital Structure

    Euro Manganese Converts $23.5 Million Orion Debt to Royalty at Czech Chvaletice Project to Simplify Capital Structure

    Euro Manganese has amended its financing facility with Orion Resource Partners, converting US$23.5 million in outstanding debt and accrued interest into a royalty structure on the Chvaletice Manganese Project in the Czech Republic — a move designed to simplify the company’s capital structure and provide greater flexibility as it advances the project through permitting, financing and market conditions.

    Under the revised agreement, the outstanding loan and accrued interest will automatically convert into a royalty once a fundraising condition is met by a date acceptable to Orion, fully discharging the company’s repayment obligation. The revised structure removes time-based milestones contained in previous versions of the agreement. Following conversion, the royalty will range from 2.29% to 2.46% of project revenues, calculated quarterly on a sliding scale linked to achieved prices for the project’s high-purity manganese products.

    CEO Martina Blahova said the restructuring was a constructive outcome. “By converting the existing facility into a royalty, we are simplifying our capital structure, improving financing flexibility and positioning the company to advance the Chvaletice Manganese Project through its next stage of development,” she said. Chairman Rick Anthon described the revised arrangement as reflecting the strength of the company’s relationship with Orion, providing a clearer and simpler capital structure heading into the next development phase.

    Orion retains offtake rights covering 20% to 22.5% of the project’s high-purity manganese production for ten years from first delivery, with offtake terms matched to commercial terms achieved by the company to meet bankability requirements. The original Orion funding package, announced in November 2023, was structured as US$100 million split into two US$50 million components.

    The Chvaletice project aims to reprocess historic mine tailings to produce high-purity electrolytic manganese metal and high-purity manganese sulphate monohydrate — battery materials in growing demand for EV cathode manufacturing.

  • DPM Metals Closes Ada Tepe Gold Mine for Rehabilitation as Chelopech Delivers Strong H1 Results and Major Porphyry Discovery Advances

    DPM Metals Closes Ada Tepe Gold Mine for Rehabilitation as Chelopech Delivers Strong H1 Results and Major Porphyry Discovery Advances

    Canadian mining company DPM Metals is closing its Ada Tepe gold mine in Bulgaria for rehabilitation on 15 July, following a final production blast at the site in mid-April. The mine produced 23,000 ounces of gold in the first half of 2026 before ceasing operations. DPM said that after rehabilitation, 95% of Ada Tepe’s land use will be returned to the Natura 2000 EU nature protection network.

    The closure marks the end of Ada Tepe’s operating life, while DPM’s other Bulgarian asset, the Chelopech gold-copper mine, continues to perform in line with expectations. Chelopech delivered 75,000 ounces of gold and 15 million pounds of copper in the six months through June, including 43,000 ounces of gold and 8 million pounds of copper in the second quarter alone. The mine is on track to achieve its full-year production guidance and had its operating life extended by ten years to 2036 in February based on updated mineral reserve estimates.

    Chelopech is also the focus of significant exploration activity. In June, DPM announced the discovery of high-grade gold-copper porphyry mineralisation at the Brevene South Porphyry target adjacent to the mine, with a standout drill hole returning 713 metres grading 1.31 grams per tonne gold and 1.16% copper — results that analysts described as distinguishing the BSP as a potentially very high-grade porphyry system. In May, the company also identified new high-grade intercepts at the Wedge Zone Deep target within the Chelopech mine licence area.

  • Europe’s Critical Materials Problem Is Not Too Much Regulation — It Is Too Little Orchestrated Demand

    Europe’s Critical Materials Problem Is Not Too Much Regulation — It Is Too Little Orchestrated Demand

    Whenever Europe falls behind in a strategic technology, the diagnosis defaults to the same cause: excessive regulation and insufficient risk appetite. Regulation can and should be simplified. But that is not the binding constraint holding back European critical materials supply chains. The real problem is the failure to turn world-class science into industrial scale — and the specific mechanism missing is aggregated, committed demand that turns potential buyers into anchor customers.

    Writing in the context of the EIT RawMaterials Summit 2026, Victor Mulas identifies a structural gap that is both precise and actionable. Europe produces serious research, capable entrepreneurs, promising companies and sophisticated industrial buyers. What it lacks is the coordination infrastructure that converts those ingredients into industries.

    What Japan does differently

    The contrast with Japan is instructive. Several European players in critical materials recycling are reaching commercial scale — HyProMag has opened a magnet-recycling plant in Germany, and Carester’s CareMag is building one of Europe’s first large-scale rare earth recycling and refining facilities in France. But each company assembled the missing commercial piece on its own: Carester through a ten-year Stellantis offtake agreement and Japanese state and industrial backing; HyProMag through individual industrial buyer relationships. The science was not the binding constraint. Bankable demand was — and in Europe, a company still secures it deal by deal.

    Japan, through JOGMEC and METI, does more of the orchestrating that Europe leaves to private initiative: equity, loans and guarantees the private sector will not provide alone, strategic stockpiles, recycling targets, and consortia that align buyers, researchers and processing capacity before projects need to stand on their own. The technology gap between Europe and Japan is small. The commercialisation gap is considerably larger.

    Lessons from Warp Speed and NASA

    The constraint for European startups is rarely the science. It is reaching scale at the speed the challenge demands. Neither Europe nor Japan can match American scale-up capital — but what both can do is manufacture scale on the demand side by committing to buy a solution before it exists. When NASA needed cargo delivered to the International Space Station, it did not build the vehicle itself; it part-funded development and bought delivery as a service. That combination drew in private capital and built the commercial launch industry that now leads the world. Operation Warp Speed applied the same logic to vaccines.

    Europe is beginning to build this instrument through the Raw Materials Mechanism, and proposals for a JOGMEC-style Critical Raw Materials Centre point in the same direction. But current tools remain too close to voluntary matchmaking. What is needed are two more forceful applications: EU-aggregated pre-purchase, pooling member states behind a clearly specified solution that does not yet exist; and the coordinated buying power of Europe’s large global companies, whose balance sheets and demand volumes can call a market into being.

    Guaranteed demand will not immediately make European critical materials supply cheaper than China’s. But that gap should not be treated as an inefficient subsidy. It should be treated as a strategic autonomy premium — the price of resilience against geopolitical shocks, export controls and supply disruption. Paid upfront, it buys the volume and time to drive costs down to competitive levels, through procurement rather than deregulation.

    Cluster or fall behind

    Europe has the ingredients: research, talent, corporations and procurement budgets. What it lacks is the connective infrastructure that turns them into industries — aggregated demand, patient capital to bridge the gap from pilot to plant, and institutions accountable for carrying named ventures to a first commercial contract. Europe funds many clusters and hubs; what it rarely runs is a programme with accountability for specific commercial outcomes. Without it, results come too slowly and at too small a scale.

    The opportunity grows with connection to like-minded economies facing the same vulnerabilities — Japan, South Korea, the UK, Canada and Australia. Linking European innovators to these ecosystems can open access to buyers, capital and expertise that no single region can reach alone. The technologies that will define strategic autonomy in this decade are already in European laboratories. The science is there, and so is the ambition. What is needed is the orchestration to turn them into industrial outcomes.

  • NATO Launches 12-Nation Critical Raw Materials Project for Defence Supply Chains at Ankara Summit

    NATO Launches 12-Nation Critical Raw Materials Project for Defence Supply Chains at Ankara Summit

    NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte has announced the launch of a new multinational High Visibility Project on defence critical raw materials, bringing together 12 Allied nations to jointly strengthen the resilience of defence industrial supply chains.

    The project was announced on 7 July 2026 at the NATO Summit Defence Industry Forum in Ankara. It focuses on the acquisition, storage, transport and management of critical raw materials, components and recycled products essential for defence production — addressing vulnerabilities that have become increasingly visible as China’s export controls on strategic minerals have disrupted Western manufacturing.

    “For our defence to remain ready and strong, we need our industrial base and our supply chains to be resilient,” Rutte said at the forum.

    The 12 participating Allies are Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, Greece, Italy, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, Norway, Spain, Sweden and Turkey. The initiative reflects growing Allied consensus that access to critical materials — including rare earths, tungsten, antimony and other defence-critical inputs — cannot be left to market forces alone and requires coordinated sovereign stockpiling, sourcing and logistics strategies.

    The announcement was made in Ankara, a city that hosted the MINEX Asia 2026 forum the previous month, where Turkey’s role as a potential industrial anchor for Central Asian critical minerals supply chains was a central theme — underlining the geographic and strategic significance of the Turkish capital in the emerging critical minerals geopolitical landscape.

  • US Trade Court Orders Review of Antidumping Ruling Against Kazakh Ferrosilicon Producers Kazchrome and YDD Corporation

    US Trade Court Orders Review of Antidumping Ruling Against Kazakh Ferrosilicon Producers Kazchrome and YDD Corporation

    The United States Court of International Trade has ordered the US Department of Commerce to reconsider elements of its antidumping determination against ferrosilicon exported to the American market by Kazakhstan’s Kazchrome and Karaganda-based YDD Corporation, following a legal challenge filed by the two companies.

    The court returned specific questions to the Department of Commerce for further consideration, including the treatment of YDD’s sales to its American customer and the date of sale applied to Kazchrome’s transactions. The court also deferred its ruling on the Department of Commerce’s application of partial adverse facts available — a methodology used to calculate dumping margins when companies fail to provide complete information — and on YDD’s antidumping duty calculation, pending resolution of the remanded sales question.

    The court ordered the matter to be returned for further review with supplementary materials and comments from the parties. Key points of contention during proceedings centred on the calculation of YDD’s margin in light of its product deliveries routed through the US to Canada, and the pricing timeline for Kazchrome’s sales to its trader Telf AG at the point of shipment to the American market.

    In May 2025, the US imposed countervailing duties on Kazakhstani ferrosilicon producers following an investigation: 16.82% on YDD Corporation and affiliated companies, and 265.53% on Kazchrome and its trader Telf AG. The measures followed complaints by US producers CC Metals and Alloys LLC and Ferroglobe USA Inc alleging material injury from unfair trade practices.

    Kazchrome is part of Eurasian Resources Group and represents the group’s primary revenue source. The Kazakhstani government holds a 40% stake in ERG. The Karaganda YDD plant was partially oriented toward the American market and was built with financing from the Development Bank of Kazakhstan. The plant’s ownership is also reported to be changing hands.

  • Ann Mettler on Europe’s toxic complacency, cleantech challenge & energy security crisis (RM#12)

    Ann Mettler on Europe’s toxic complacency, cleantech challenge & energy security crisis (RM#12)

     

    Ann Mettler on Europe’s toxic complacency, cleantech failure & energy security crisis [RAW MATTERS GRANDE FINALE, RM#12 – Ann Mettler, Julia Poliscanova, Peter Tom Jones]

    We end Season 1 of the Raw Matters podcast with a big bang. We close with a conversation that goes straight to the heart of Europe’s competitiveness and energy‑security challenge.

    After a season of deep dives into critical minerals, geopolitics and industrial strategy, we end with someone who has shaped Europe’s thinking at the highest levels: Ann Mettler, President of Catalyse Europe, former VP at Breakthrough Energy (with Bill Gates), and one of Europe’s sharpest voices on industrial strategy and clean tech.

    Hosts Peter Tom Jones and Julia Poliscanova open with the uncomfortable question: How did Europe manage to deepen its fossil‑fuel dependencies while simultaneously creating new ones for the clean‑energy transition?

    This paradox sets the tone for a conversation about Europe’s “toxic complacency” – a theme Ann has highlighted repeatedly (cf. Quote by Sir Richard Shirreff), and one that now defines the continent’s strategic vulnerability.

    We explore Ann’s professional journey, then dive into the big issues:

    👉 The staggering cost of Europe’s fossil‑fuel exposure, from Ukraine to the Hormuz crisis.
    👉 Whether the Draghi report’s diagnosis of Europe’s competitiveness gap is being acted upon.
    👉 Why Europe’s energy security – in fuels, technologies and critical minerals – remains fragile.

    From there, we zoom into cleantech: the battleground where Europe’s future will be decided. Ann explains why Europe cannot rely on cheap imported batteries – the general‑purpose technology of the electrification age, essential not only for EVs but also for stationary storage and defence (drones, humanoid robots). “We cannot and should not rely on China for critical infrastructure.”

    We discuss which technologies Europe must fight to keep, which ones to onshore, and which ones to strategically let go. And which Asian partners Europe should work with and why technology alliances matter.

    We close with the policy angle. Ann deliberately avoids commenting on specific policy files (CRMA, IAA, Circular Economy Act…). Instead, she exposes the systemic problem: silo‑based policymaking in the EU and the lack of people in Brussels who genuinely understand how industry works, how technology functions or how investments are made. Echoing Salvatore Pinizzotto, she calls for real synchronisation in policymaking and genuine “ecosystem building”, overcoming the endemic “professional optimism” in the Brussels bubble.

    This GRANDE FINALE is a wake‑up call. Unless Europe confronts its toxic complacency, it will continue drifting into deeper dependency at the very moment it needs strategic autonomy the most.

  • “Stop dawdling: Central Asia’s critical minerals revolution is here” (Amir Abidov, RM#11)

    “Stop dawdling: Central Asia’s critical minerals revolution is here” (Amir Abidov, RM#11)

    🎙️ “Stop dawdling: Central Asia’s critical minerals revolution is here” (Raw Matters podcast Episode #11, with Amir Abidov)

    Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan are ready to do CRM business with the EU but will not wait forever. Europe must decide quickly. Get on the bus or get left behind.

    Some hard talk by Amir Abidov (UzTMK) in the Raw Matters podcast (Episode #11), hosted by Peter Tom Jones and Julia Poliscanova.

    After months of posts, debates, MoU’s and Julia’s jokes about my “Central Asia obsession”, we finally bring Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan into the centre of Europe’s critical minerals narrative – where they belong.

    For this episode we welcomed Amir Abidov, Deputy Chairman of TMK (Uzbekistan Technological Metals Complex), the massive state-led CRM company in Uzbekistan (population: 39 million). Getting Amir into the studio was a journey in itself, involving last-minute travel across Europe, a stop at Neo Performance Materials Silmet in Estonia, excessive heat, and a shared determination to make sure Central Asia speaks for itself in the EU CRM debate.

    We open with the big picture: both Uzbekistan and #Kazakhstan have signed Strategic Partnerships with the EU. Both are rich in critical minerals. Both are moving fast. And both are ready to do business with Europe – now. The question is whether Europe can keep up.

    With Amir, we explore Uzbekistan’s resource potential. We compare UZ and KZ – two neighbours with different strategies, different industrial legacies, and a different energy basis.

    A key theme is the Green Resource Curse and how Uzbekistan can overcome it. Or better: how it is already taking massive strides in overcoming it. Amir explains how Uzbekistan is building real midstream and downstream cleantech capacity rather than just exporting raw materials.

    We then confront the geopolitical reality: Can Europe offer a credible, respectful, win‑win collaboration model – or will it miss the bus? We compare the Chinese, US and EU approaches, discuss the CRMA, and outline what Uzbekistan actually expects from Europe: technology transfer, expertise and offtake. We also touch on the role of bottom‑up collaboration with research centres (such as SOLVOMET R&T Centre (KU Leuven)’s collaboration on rare-earth SX with UzTMK) as a complement to top‑down EU policy. In the ideal world both strategies support each other.

    This episode is a wake‑up call for all Europeans. We need to recalibrate our position in the world, be more humble and react faster. Europe must decide whether it wants to be on the bus, or watch it drive away.