MINEX Forum

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  • Kyrgyzstan Courts Western Mining Capital With Critical Minerals Reset — But Legal Gaps and Kumtor’s Shadow Complicate the Pitch

    Kyrgyzstan Courts Western Mining Capital With Critical Minerals Reset — But Legal Gaps and Kumtor’s Shadow Complicate the Pitch

    In a nondescript meeting room in London late last year, a high-level Kyrgyz government delegation sat down with Western mining investors to discuss something that would have seemed improbable just five years ago: bringing foreign capital back into a country that had recently nationalised its most prized mining asset.

    The meeting was the opening move in what Bishkek is quietly calling a reset — an attempt to use surging global demand for critical minerals as a bridge back to Western investment after the Kumtor affair severed relations with North American mining capital and left deep scars on both sides. How far and how fast that bridge can be built is the central question facing an initiative that is carefully engineered but resting on fragile foundations.

    The Kumtor saga looms over everything. Kyrgyzstan wrested control of the country’s largest gold mine from Canadian miner Centerra Gold — which had entered the country during the murky post-Soviet privatisations of the 1990s — raising serious concerns among international investors about property rights, contract security and political risk in the country. But the affair also surfaced allegations of corruption, environmental damage and resource-stripping that gave many Kyrgyz citizens an equally dim view of foreign mining investment. Any reset must therefore be politically defensible in Bishkek while simultaneously convincing outside investors that contracts will be honoured and disputes resolved without arbitrary political intervention.

    President Sadyr Japarov — who built his political career leading the campaign for Kumtor’s nationalisation before riding that wave to the presidency in the 2020 revolution — has shaped the reset accordingly. The initiative emphasises ESG standards heavily, targets critical minerals rather than gold, and focuses on UK and European investors rather than Canadian ones. State-backed assets are being offered as minority stakes, mostly in polymetallic deposits with complex metallurgy that Western expertise can help unlock, while ultimate control remains in Kyrgyz hands. A 30% free-carried government interest, as seen in the Silvercorp Metals deal that saw the Canadian company pay $160 million for a 70% interest in the Tulkubash and Kyzyltash gold projects in January, signals that the state intends to retain meaningful participation.

    The political signalling is the reset’s strongest feature. In March 2026, the foreign ministers of all five Central Asian nations — including Kyrgyzstan — travelled to London for talks with the UK government, with mining prominently on the agenda. The alignment of interests is clear: the UK wants to secure critical mineral supply chains and counter Russian influence in Central Asia, while Kyrgyzstan wants to develop its mineral wealth and reduce over-dependence on its powerful neighbours to the north and east. The projects on offer are also sensibly scoped — a portfolio of small to medium-sized assets with moderate capital requirements that risk-tolerant investors could move on quickly.

    Legal protection is where the reset looks most vulnerable. Investor briefing materials reference discussions about adopting English common-law protections and establishing independent arbitration mechanisms, but no new protections are yet in place. EU investors can rely on a modern bilateral investment treaty dating from 2024. UK investors must fall back on a 1994 treaty. Canadian investors have no treaty protection at all — as Centerra discovered to its cost.

    The most realistic near-term outcome is a first wave of specialist mining equity from risk-tolerant investors who understand frontier jurisdictions and will price Kyrgyzstan’s assets with a heavy discount reflecting its recent history. That is not mainstream capital, and it will not come cheaply. But if early projects are licensed, developed and exited without political interference, Kyrgyzstan can begin to rebuild its reputation as an international mining jurisdiction — and lay the groundwork for the larger-scale investment that its mineral endowment could ultimately attract.

  • Chinese Sorting Technology Firm Meiteng Completes Tajikistan Lead-Zinc Trial as It Expands Across Central Asia and Russia

    Chinese Sorting Technology Firm Meiteng Completes Tajikistan Lead-Zinc Trial as It Expands Across Central Asia and Russia

    Tianjin Meiteng Technology, a Chinese intelligent mining sorting technology provider, has completed the trial operation of an ore sorting system at Tajik-China Mining’s lead-zinc operations in Tajikistan, successfully commissioning five XRT sorting units in a project that the company describes as a key milestone in its international expansion.

    Tajik-China Mining is one of Tajikistan’s largest mining enterprises and Asia’s largest lead producer, operating primarily in Sughd Province near Zarnisor with a fully integrated chain spanning exploration, mining, beneficiation and smelting. The company accounts for approximately 50% of Tajikistan’s total mining output. Despite its scale, its beneficiation plant has long contended with difficult operating conditions — ore grades are low, temperatures swing between -35°C and +40°C, and the combination has historically driven high grinding mill loads, elevated processing costs and equipment reliability problems.

    An earlier attempt to address these challenges with sensor-based sorting technology introduced in 2023 failed to achieve continuous and stable operation. In 2025, Tajik-China Mining brought in three XRT units from Meiteng to sort ore in the 70 to 30 millimetre and 30 to 10 millimetre size fractions. Trial operation began in October 2025, and by the time the system was formally commissioned in March 2026, the cumulative waste rejection rate had reached 14.83%, with lead and zinc grades in the tailings consistently controlled at around 0.4% — results Meiteng says exceeded all design expectations. Following project completion, Meiteng also retrofitted the previously installed third-party equipment that had failed to operate reliably, restoring it to normal production, and has since taken over operation and maintenance of all XRT units on site under a customer-authorised arrangement.

    The Tajikistan project forms part of a broader Central Asian push by Meiteng, which listed on Shanghai’s STAR Market eight years after its founding and has since formed joint ventures with two Fortune Global 500 companies — Shandong Energy Group and Jinneng Holding Group — to advance intelligent mineral processing technology. Following the Tajikistan delivery, the company established a Central Asia-dedicated spare parts warehouse, technical service team and commercial network. It has since deployed five additional XRT and TGS fine coal sorting systems across mining operations in Kazakhstan’s Karaganda Region and Russia’s Kemerovo Region, handling particle sizes from 400 millimetres down to 6 millimetres across underground, surface and open-pit applications.

  • Cornwall’s Lithium Revival Offers Hope to England’s Most Deprived Mining Towns — But Jobs Promise Falls Short of the Legend

    Cornwall’s Lithium Revival Offers Hope to England’s Most Deprived Mining Towns — But Jobs Promise Falls Short of the Legend

    In a glass cabinet at the King Edward Mine Museum near Redruth, a bright blue display for Cornish Lithium sits incongruously among Victorian machinery and sepia-toned mining uniforms. It is, in its way, an apt symbol of what is happening beneath England’s most westerly county: the return of mining to a landscape that lost it, and the complicated question of what that return will actually deliver.

    Cornwall sits on one of Europe’s largest lithium deposits, a fact that has sent politicians into something approaching rapture. Boris Johnson called it the “Klondike of lithium” in 2021. Keir Starmer described critical minerals as “the backbone of modern life” last year. UK demand for lithium is projected to rise by 1,100% by 2035, driven by the government’s electric vehicle and battery storage ambitions. China controls roughly a quarter of global production and more than half of global processing capacity, and ministers are scrambling for alternatives. Cornwall, they hope, is part of the answer.

    Three companies are attempting to make that ambition real. Geothermal Engineering Ltd produced Britain’s first commercial battery-grade lithium earlier this year — somewhat accidentally, as the firm’s chief operating officer Tony Wilson acknowledges. GEL’s primary business is geothermal energy: water is pumped five kilometres into naturally heated granite, brought back to near boiling point and driven through a turbine to generate enough electricity for 10,000 homes. The lithium is a byproduct extracted from the brine before the water is returned underground. “Our lithium concentrations are actually going up rather than going down,” Wilson says. GEL believes it can produce enough lithium carbonate to supply around 250,000 electric vehicles a year within a decade, and targets around 10,000 tonnes of annual lithium carbonate by 2030 — approximately a fifth of the government’s projected UK demand.

    Cornish Lithium has been producing battery-grade samples through hard rock mining since late 2025 and targets a commercial plant by 2029. It projects a similar volume of output and 300 direct jobs over the 20-year lifespan of its Trelavour project, plus 800 during construction. The South Crofty tin mine — the UK’s last, closed in 1998 — is also being reopened to meet growing critical minerals demand.

    The jobs question is the one that matters most to communities like Redruth, which ranks among England’s most deprived towns. In its Victorian heyday, mining employed 30% of men aged 15 to 69 in the area. The collapse, when it came, was devastating — cheaper foreign tin and copper flooded the market, and tens of thousands emigrated in the late 19th century, giving rise to the old saying that at the bottom of every hole in the world, you will find a Cornishman. Today the economy runs on seasonal tourism, daffodil picking and foodbanks. Younger people leave. “Mining is well-paid, well-qualified work,” says David Ager, chairman of the King Edward Mine Museum. “This gives young people an opportunity to make a living here.”

    But the promise has already been punctured once. The most ambitious project on paper — a joint venture between British Lithium and French mining giant Imerys, sitting on one of the UK’s largest confirmed deposits near St Austell — was mothballed in February 2026 after Imerys pulled its funding. Global lithium prices had crashed more than 80% from their 2022 peak, driven by oversupply and slower-than-expected electric vehicle adoption. Between 40 and 70 employees were made redundant. The promised 300 jobs will likely not materialise.

    There is a further structural constraint even for the projects that do proceed. Cornwall can produce raw lithium — but that is only the first step. The metal must be refined and processed into cathode active material before it enters a battery cell. China controls around 60% of that processing capacity, meaning Cornish lithium could still be shipped east for processing before returning as battery components. Green Lithium’s planned Teesside refinery, targeted for completion by 2029, is the only domestic answer currently on the horizon.

    The Camborne School of Mines has relaunched its mining engineering degree at the University of Exeter, and early signs of workforce renewal are emerging. Wilson notes that staff are already working at GEL who would not otherwise be in Cornwall. A statue of a tin miner stands in the centre of Redruth, pick in one hand, ingot in the other. Whether a future statue will hold a battery and a bag of metallic powder remains uncertain. But the direction of travel, at least, has changed.

  • Germany and Brazil Forge Strategic Partnership on Raw Materials and Defence as Berlin Seeks to Break Asia’s Rare Earth Grip

    Germany and Brazil Forge Strategic Partnership on Raw Materials and Defence as Berlin Seeks to Break Asia’s Rare Earth Grip

    Germany and Brazil have agreed to significantly deepen their strategic partnership, with rare earth metals, defence contracts and supply chain diversification at the heart of a new bilateral framework unveiled following government consultations in Hanover.

    German Chancellor Friedrich Merz said he hoped to double the volume of trade with Brazil in the coming years, describing the relationship as a critical hedge against global supply chain vulnerability at a moment of fundamental geopolitical change. “The closeness between our two countries is more necessary than ever at a time when the world order is changing so fundamentally,” Merz said at a joint press conference with Brazilian President Luiz Inácio Lula da Silva.

    Rare earth metals — essential inputs for laptops, mobile phones and the electric motors used in wind turbines — are a central pillar of the agreement, as Germany and the broader European Union seek to reduce a deep dependency on Asian, and particularly Chinese, supply chains. The two governments also agreed to expand cooperation in artificial intelligence, energy, the circular economy, environmental technologies, agriculture and the defence sector.

    Lula was emphatic that the partnership would not replicate historical patterns of resource extraction without industrial benefit for Brazil. “We will not accept models that reduce our country to resource extraction simply to satisfy foreign demand,” he said, framing the agreement as a bidirectional industrial partnership rather than a supplier-client arrangement. The Brazilian president’s remarks reflect a broader posture among resource-rich emerging economies that are increasingly seeking to capture processing and manufacturing value from their natural endowments rather than exporting raw materials alone.

    Both leaders welcomed the EU-Mercosur free trade agreement, an interim version of which enters into force on 1 May ahead of full ratification of the main deal — a framework that provides the commercial scaffolding for the expanded bilateral relationship. The German economy ministry and European wind industry developed a roadmap last year for reducing the bloc’s reliance on rare earth metals in wind turbines, and Brazil’s resources position it as a potentially significant contributor to that effort. Canada has also moved to position itself as a rare earth supplier to Europe, intensifying competition for the supply agreements Germany is now actively pursuing across multiple continents.

  • Uzbekistan’s Navoiyuran Commissions Kizilkok Uranium Mine as Output Surges 35% to 7,000 Tonnes and Sulphuric Acid Costs Loom

    Uzbekistan’s Navoiyuran Commissions Kizilkok Uranium Mine as Output Surges 35% to 7,000 Tonnes and Sulphuric Acid Costs Loom

    Uzbekistan’s state uranium company Navoiyuran has commissioned the Kizilkok uranium mine in Navoiy Region, marking a significant addition to the country’s production base as it pursues an ambitious expansion programme targeting higher output by 2030.

    Pilot industrial operations at Kizilkok began in December 2024, and the project reached commercial production status within two years of active work, according to Navoiyuran director general Jamal Fayzullayev, quoted in a World Nuclear Association industry publication. The mine is expected to operate for 15 years with peak annual production of up to 1,200 tonnes of uranium, making a meaningful contribution to a national output target that has already seen dramatic growth. Navoiyuran produced 7,000 tonnes of uranium in 2025 — a 35% increase on the 5,200 tonnes extracted in 2024.

    Kizilkok’s reserves are estimated at 9,400 tonnes with resources of 10,900 tonnes, making it the third-largest asset in Navoiyuran’s portfolio after the Sugrali deposit at 20,800 tonnes and Uchkuduk at 14,800 tonnes. The company manages 43 uranium deposits in total, with a combined resource base of 151,100 tonnes including approximately 96,600 tonnes of reserves. The new mine is developed using oxygen-based in-situ leaching technology with low-activity chemical reagents, which reduces extraction costs. Navoiyuran’s total cash costs stand at $27 per pound of uranium oxide — higher than Kazatomprom’s C1 cost of above $18 per pound in 2025, though both companies benefit from the in-situ leaching method that dominates Central Asian uranium production.

    The production surge is generating a significant side effect: rapidly rising demand for sulphuric acid, a key reagent in the leaching process. The pressure on acid supply mirrors a trend already visible in Kazakhstan, where growing uranium output has similarly driven domestic demand to the point where exports ceased several years ago. Uzbekistan is set to commission a new sulphuric acid plant with capacity of 500,000 tonnes this year to supplement locally produced acid from metallurgical by-products — but the new facility will itself require large volumes of processed sulphur that domestic oil and gas cannot fully supply, creating a dependency on imports from Kazakhstan and other countries. With geopolitical pressures pushing sulphur prices to as high as $500 per tonne in some markets, rising input costs could weigh on Uzbekistan’s uranium production economics as output continues to grow.

    Financially, Navoiyuran reported revenues of $1.112 billion in 2025, with adjusted net profit rising to $472 million and an average realisation price of $69.50 per pound of uranium oxide. By comparison, Kazatomprom — the world’s largest uranium producer — recorded sales of approximately $3.9 billion at an average price of $65.32 per pound on volumes of 13,700 tonnes, with net profit of approximately $1.7 billion.

  • Norway Takes State Control of Fen Rare Earth Project After Resource Nearly Doubles to 15.9 Million Tonnes — Europe’s Largest Deposit

    Norway Takes State Control of Fen Rare Earth Project After Resource Nearly Doubles to 15.9 Million Tonnes — Europe’s Largest Deposit

    Norway’s government has stepped in to assume direct planning authority over the Fen rare earth deposit in Telemark, Europe’s largest known rare earth resource, citing the need to accelerate development and resolve potential land-use conflicts after a resource upgrade last month nearly doubled the project’s estimated size.

    The deposit was upgraded to 15.9 million metric tonnes of rare earth oxide in indicated and inferred resources — 81% larger than a 2024 estimate — a revision that significantly enhances Fen’s strategic importance to Europe’s push to reduce dependence on China, which dominates global rare earth production and processing. Europe currently has no operating rare earth mines.

    Prime Minister Jonas Gahr Stoere framed the government’s intervention in explicit supply security terms. “The Fen field could be of major significance for Telemark, Norway and Europe’s supply security and competitiveness,” he said. “To ensure future access to critical minerals, it is important to increase production both in Norway and in other countries with which we cooperate in terms of security.”

    The government said it had taken over planning at the request of the local authority, pointing to the risk of land-use disputes and the need to balance competing national interests — a challenge familiar across Europe, where onshore infrastructure projects including wind farms have repeatedly faced delays due to opposition from environmental and agricultural groups.

    Approximately 19% of the oxides at Fen are neodymium and praseodymium, the heavy rare earth materials used in permanent magnets for electric vehicles, wind turbines, electronics and defence systems — placing them among the most strategically sensitive materials in the global energy transition. Developer Rare Earths Norway has said it expects production to begin in late 2031, with output of 800 tonnes of NdPr by 2032, equivalent to approximately 5% of total European Union demand.

  • KGHM Confirmed as World’s Second-Largest Silver Producer With 1,347 Tonnes Output as Polish Miner Expands Rudna Mine

    KGHM Confirmed as World’s Second-Largest Silver Producer With 1,347 Tonnes Output as Polish Miner Expands Rudna Mine

    Polish state-controlled mining giant KGHM has been ranked the world’s second-largest silver producer, generating 1,347 tonnes of the metal in 2025 — placing it behind only Mexico’s Fresnillo, which produced approximately 1,517 tonnes, according to the World Silver Survey, the industry’s longest-running annual market report now in its 36th year.

    Global silver production exceeded 26,000 tonnes in 2025, the survey found, with KGHM’s output reflecting the scale of its integrated mining complex in southwestern Poland. Silver is produced as a by-product of copper extraction at the company’s Lubin, Rudna and Polkowice-Sieroszowice operations and refined at the Głogów smelter, which has been processing precious metals from copper ore since 1993. The company sells silver in granulated form for industrial customers and as bullion bars primarily supplied to financial institutions, with smaller bars for private investors introduced last year.

    KGHM chief executive Remigiusz Paszkiewicz said the ranking reflected sustained effort rather than a single strong year. “This is not a one-time success, but the result of consistently building operational and technological advantage,” he said.

    Silver’s industrial importance continues to grow, with applications in electronics, renewable energy, medicine and jewellery accounting for nearly 60% of global demand — a figure that underpins the metal’s long-term strategic value alongside its role as a financial asset.

    Beyond silver, KGHM ranks among the world’s top ten copper producers and operates assets across Europe and the Americas, including in the United States and Canada. The Polish state holds just under a third of the company’s shares, making it the largest single shareholder.

    On the capital investment front, KGHM is expanding the Rudna mine in Lower Silesia — one of the world’s largest copper operations — with plans to sink a new shaft that could take up to 12 years to complete. The project carries a price tag of several billion zloty, with the final cost dependent on depth, eventual use and other technical factors.

  • Ferrexpo Warns of Total Investment Loss and Imminent Insolvency Risk Without $100 Million Fundraise by End of April

    Ferrexpo Warns of Total Investment Loss and Imminent Insolvency Risk Without $100 Million Fundraise by End of April

    Ukraine-focused iron ore producer Ferrexpo has issued one of the starkest warnings in its history as a listed company, telling shareholders they could lose the “entire value of their investment” if a $100 million emergency equity raise fails to complete by the end of this month — a deadline that, if missed, would trigger a suspension of its London shares and potentially force the group into insolvency.

    Shares in the Baar, Switzerland-headquartered FTSE 250 company fell 12% to 37.98 pence in London on Wednesday morning following the announcement. Ferrexpo said it currently has sufficient cash to operate only until around the end of August, with net cash at 17 April standing at just $20 million — down sharply from $101 million at the end of 2024. The proposed $100 million raise, described as the “only viable solution” available in the required timeframe, would cover short-term operational requirements at a reduced production level for the next 18 months.

    The company’s financial position has been severely eroded by the compounding effect of three overlapping crises: the ongoing war in Ukraine, the suspension by Ukrainian tax authorities of VAT refund payments to the group, and a legal claim against its main operating subsidiary FPM. Without recovery of the VAT refunds — which Ferrexpo acknowledged is outside its control — the group warned it would have “no option but to file for insolvency” if the fundraise does not proceed.

    The equity raise must be launched and completed on or before the end of April for Ferrexpo to be able to publish its audited 2025 financial results. If that deadline is not met, the company expects its shares will be suspended from 1 May until the audit is completed — with no certainty provided on when, or whether, trading would resume. “In such a scenario, there can be no certainty as to the expected timing of the lifting of the suspension of listing and resumption of trading of the company’s shares, if at all,” the company warned.

    Talks are continuing with Fevamotinico Sarl, which holds a 49% stake in Ferrexpo, regarding the potential dilution of its interests as a result of the fundraise and whether it will participate. The outcome of those discussions is material to the viability of the raise. Ferrexpo said a successful capital injection would strengthen liquidity, provide working capital and position the company to restore production capacity to a sustainable level, with potential for longer-term recovery once operating conditions stabilise.

  • Slovenian and Hungarian Consortium Launches Takeover Bid for Remaining Stake in Bosnian Bauxite Miner

    Slovenian and Hungarian Consortium Launches Takeover Bid for Remaining Stake in Bosnian Bauxite Miner

    A consortium comprising Slovenian alumina and zeolite producer Silkem Plus and two Hungarian holding companies, Aela and Atesz, has launched a joint tender offer to acquire the remaining shares in Bosnian bauxite miner Rudnici Boksita Jajce that they do not already own.

    The consortium announced the offer in a filing to the Sarajevo Stock Exchange on Wednesday, pricing the bid at 51.41 convertible marks ($30.80) per share. The offer will remain open for 28 days.

    The three companies collectively hold a controlling stake of 67.63% in Rudnici Boksita Jajce, split between Silkem Plus at 30.65%, Aela at 20.43% and Atesz at 16.55%. The takeover bid targets the remaining 32.37% of the company’s equity. Rudnici Boksita Jajce has 186,321 shares in issue, each with a nominal value of 27 marks. The company’s shares have not traded on the Sarajevo bourse in the past year.

  • Europe’s Green Energy Dream Collides With Local Fears at Czech Lithium Deposit Straddling German Border

    Europe’s Green Energy Dream Collides With Local Fears at Czech Lithium Deposit Straddling German Border

    In Cinovec, a small mountain town perched on the Czech-German border known for its clean air, pine forests and spa tourism, plans to extract one of Europe’s largest lithium deposits have opened a fault line between the promises of the green energy transition and the concerns of the communities expected to live with its consequences.

    The project is led by Geomet, the Czech subsidiary of London-listed European Metals Holdings, which argues that developing the deposit will bring jobs, investment and economic growth to a region that has long struggled to diversify beyond traditional industries. The Cinovec deposit has been confirmed as one of the largest hard-rock lithium resources in Europe, and its development is seen as strategically significant for the continent’s ambition to reduce dependence on imported battery materials, particularly from China.

    But for many residents, the prospect of industrial-scale mining in a landscape still bearing the scars of decades of coal extraction sits uneasily. The area around Cinovec is in the early stages of ecological recovery from the environmental damage wrought by its communist-era mining past, and locals fear that lithium extraction could set that recovery back — contaminating water sources, generating dust and noise, and undermining the region’s carefully rebuilt identity as a destination for health tourism and outdoor recreation. Tourism represents a significant share of the local economy, and business owners worry that the imagery of an active mine would deter the visitors on whom they depend.

    Geomet has maintained that the project will meet strict environmental standards and that modern mining techniques bear little resemblance to the open-cast coal operations that scarred the landscape in previous generations. The company points to the project’s classification as a strategic resource by both the European Union and the Czech government as evidence of its broader importance.

    The standoff at Cinovec is not unique. Across Europe, communities sitting above critical mineral deposits are grappling with the same fundamental tension: the green transition requires materials that must come from somewhere, and the places asked to provide them are not always willing to bear the costs that the broader project demands. The question of who benefits and who pays — and whether environmental pledges made at the planning stage can be trusted once extraction begins — remains unresolved at Cinovec as it does across the continent.