[ALBSA-Info] After the telcom Greece inc. eyes the cromium sector

[Kreshnik Bejko]

Metal Research Withdraws from Copper Concession

TIRANA - Utah’s Metal Research Group Corp. has withdrawn its bid to
purchase the Albanian copper industry, dashing hopes of a revival in this
sector in the country, government sources told Albanian Daily News on 
Friday.

Metal Research, which was close to reaching an agreement with the
government for a concession that would allow it to exploit the copper mines 
in
eastern Albania, enrich them at a plant in Rubik, in northern Albania, and
enable the copper wire plant in Shkodra to resume work, withdrew for reasons
government officials refused to divulge.

The government said in January it had endorsed the deal with Metal Research
Group, while the Ministry said it expected the take-over of the industry by 
June
13, last Monday.

“The last information we had from them was not clear at all,” Halit 
Shqarthi, the
general director of the Albanian copper corporation, Albbakri, told daily 
Koha
Jone.

A trade unionist of the copper industry was bitter: “It would be better if
Albanians themselves invested in the industry,” said Kole Nikolli 
sarcastically,
given the poverty of Albania and its inability to rebuild the once-booming 
mining
industry.

The newspaper cited a Greek company that has begun to approach the
government for the industry.

Metal Research would have invested $75m over five years to create a
closed-circle raw mineral extraction to metal production. It was to 
reactivate
copper mines in Vlahne and Prrollaj in the north-eastern region of Has, open
new copper resources in Munella, Karma and Perlat, and restart the plant of
Rubik and that of Shkodra.

Any take-over will dissolve Albkromi.













________________________________________________________________________
Get Your Private, Free E-mail from MSN Hotmail at http://www.hotmail.com