France’s state-backed nuclear group Orano says about 1,500 metric tons of uranium are sitting at SOMAÏR, a mine in northern Niger that the country’s military government expropriated in 2025 amid a broader break with France after the July 2023 coup.
In late September, an arbitration tribunal at the World Bank’s ICSID issued provisional measures ordering Niger not to sell or transfer that uranium while the case proceeds, essentially freezing the stock where it sits.