For more than two decades, Canadian junior miner World Wide Minerals has locked horns with Kazakhstan over a terminated uranium processing project. The dispute, which once seemed headed for resolution with a $54.5 million arbitration award, has now returned to an uneasy stalemate after Kazakhstan once again set aside that award.

The roots of the conflict stretch back to the late 1990s, when WWM invested in Kazakhstan’s uranium industry and took over the management of a major uranium-processing facility.

The Canadian firm committed resources to upgrade Kazakhstan’s uranium capabilities, but soon found itself mired in what it described at the time as “a series of government actions and bureaucratic obstacles.” These included the revocation of critical licenses and other measures that halted the company’s operations.

Eventually, the assets in Kazakhstan were seized, prompting the miner to seek compensation through international arbitration.

An international tribunal sided with the Canadian firm in 2019, finding Kazakhstan in breach of international law and the Canada-USSR Bilateral Investment Treaty. That tribunal awarded WWM over $40 million in damages, plus legal costs that brought the total to more than $50 million.

However, Kazakhstan took steps to overturn the damages portion of the award. In November 2020, the English High Court set aside the financial components, sending those aspects back to the tribunal for reconsideration.

Now, the entire award has been revoked once again, with no clear resolution on the horizon.

Critics argue that the latest court decision sends a discouraging signal to potential investors in Kazakhstan’s mining sector, with some highlighting what WWM once described as “a pattern of hostile conduct” toward its operations.

The world’s largest uranium producer, Kazatomprom, is the national operator of Kazakhstan.

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