By Enyichukwu Enemanna
A French uranium miner on Tuesday announced that it has filed a legal action in the Niger courts, challenging “arbitrary arrest, illegal detention and unjust confiscation of property” involving its staff and assets in the country.
Orano said it had been unable to establish communication with its mining director in Niger, Ibrahim Courmo, who was taken to the headquarters of the country’s external intelligence agency, Reuters quoted sources in the General Directorate of External Documentation and Surveillance as saying last week.
The mining company also added that police are preventing access to its subsidiary offices in the country’s capital, Niamey.
According to the company, Nigerien security officials last week carried out a raid on its subsidiary offices in Niamey, including Orano Mining, Somair, Cominak and Imouraren SA, where mobile phones and electronic devices belonging to staff were confiscated.
The security officials also took into custody the managing directors of those subsidiaries after they were interrogated in their offices, Orano said.
In early December last year, Orano said that Niger’s military-led government, which seized power in a coup in 2023, had taken control of the Somair mine, of which Orano owns about 63%, with the government holding the remaining stake.
The company also had a mining permit for its subsidiary, Imouraren, revoked in June 2024.
Niger and neighbouring Mali and Burkina Faso have been stepping up pressure on foreign mining companies over the past year, seizing assets and cancelling permits as all three Sahel countries look to assert more sovereignty over their natural resources.
Malian authorities have arrested foreign executives and seized gold stocks amid negotiations with mining companies in recent months.
Burkina Faso’s junta last month vowed to take control of more foreign-owned industrial mines.
