nuclear-news

Another corruption investigation of French nuclear company AREVA

Times 29th Nov 2017, The headquarters of the French state-owned company that designed Britain’s
new nuclear reactors was raided by police yesterday. About 50 officers
searched the offices of Areva, the nuclear engineering group, as part of a
preliminary inquiry into corruption allegations. The inquiry was launched
by the French national financial prosecution service into Areva’s purchase
in 2011 of uranium from Niger worth $319.8 million.

The uranium was sold later to Russian traders who made an $82 million profit and then to a
Lebanese company that made $17.6 million, according to French media
reports. A spokesman for Areva said that the deals had been lawful and were
part of negotiations with an unspecified customer to build a nuclear
reactor.

In the end the reactor was never built. A spokesman for Niger’s
government told Le Monde that it had made about $800,000 from the
transactions and had used the money to buy cars for presidential
bodyguards.

Areva, which designed the two reactors being built at Hinkley
Point by EDF, the state-owned French energy provider, is already under
investigation in connection with Niger. An inquiry was opened in 2014 into
allegations that it overpaid Uramin, a Canadian mining group, whose main
uranium mines were in Niger.

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/edition/business/french-police-raid-nuclear-developers-office-in-paris-8sk7vlptq

December 1, 2017 - Posted by Christina Macpherson | France, secrets,lies and civil liberties