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By John Helmer in Moscow Government officials refuse to provide details of the order to reopen an investigation into the two-year old collapse of Uralkali’s Mine-1 at Berezeniki. Uralkali, meanwhile, fears that a scheme of renationalization may have been started, targeting a takeover of Uralkali from its current shareholders. According to an Interfax wire service […]

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By John Helmer in Moscow Financial collapse inside Oleg Deripaska’s aluminium empire in Moscow is triggering fresh moves by rivals and critics to oust his company from Nigeria and the Republic of Guinea (Conakry). A costly electricity failure at the Aluminium Smelter Company of Nigeria (ALSCON) has already paralyzed operations there for several weeks, while […]

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By John Helmer in Moscow De Beers has a hundred-million dollar hook in its mouth, and it isn’t sure whether to bite, or try spitting it out. Russian sources say that the conditional approval, granted last month by Prime Minister Vladimir Putin for the Verkhotina diamond mining project to commence with joint venture partner LUKoil, […]

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By John Helmer in Moscow In some cultures it is considered entertaining sport for a crowd to watch roosters tear each other to death with specially-fitted steel talons. In other cultures, the crowd prefers to watch a man in fancy-dress stab a bull that has been specially bred to do nothing unpredictable with its horns. […]

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By John Helmer in Moscow Leading Russian steel producer Evraz revealed its financial crisis management plan in Moscow on Thursday, although it claimed it will try to avoid cutting domestic jobs. Evraz said it will cut output for the second half of this year by 25%, compared to to the first half, in Russia and […]