Bauxite miner Axis launches $29bn claim against Guinea

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Guinea’s second-largest bauxite producer has launched a $29bn arbitration case against the West African government.

United Arab Emirates-based Axis International said it had initiated the case before the World Bank following the “illegal revocation” of its mining permit in Guinea this year, when it said the government had also seized its mining equipment and frozen its bank accounts.

Guinea is the world’s biggest exporter of bauxite, the main ingredient of aluminium, producing about a third of the globally mined material, according to the US Geological Survey. 

However, the Guinean government has revoked a swath of licences this year across its gold, bauxite, diamond, graphite and iron sectors as the government of President Mamadi Doumbouya seeks to extract more value from the country’s significant mineral resources.

Doumbouya, who came to power in a 2021 coup, forced companies from China, Singapore and the Anglo-Australian miner Rio Tinto to work together to complete the $23bn Simandou iron ore mine, rail and port project.

His government has made it a requirement that Simandou and other mining projects move to carrying out pelletisation, which turns iron ore into higher-value pellets, and eventually refining locally as part of a programme — known as Simandou 2040 — to use natural resources to develop the country.

Doumbouya, who is seeking to legitimise his leadership through elections held on Sunday, has made the resource issue central to his presidential campaign.

Guinea’s more assertive actions are part of a broader resource nationalism trend in the region.

In neighbouring Mali, Barrick Mining in November reached a deal to end a long-running dispute with the government that had led to the company losing control of one of its most productive assets.

Many resource-rich countries have stepped up their efforts to capture more of the value from the mining industry this year, as nations throughout the world renew their interest in critical minerals.

Analysts at BMI said this month that they expected the Guinean government to demand that more bauxite processing occur in the country and predicted a “full-scale ban on bauxite exports by Guinea as a high-probability event in 2026”.

Bouna Sylla, Guinea’s mining minister, did not immediately respond to a request for comment about Axis. But in an interview with the Financial Times in November he said that companies that breached agreements would be penalised.

Sylla objected to the term “expropriation” in relation to the revocation of an agreement with Emirates Global Aluminium, which ran a bauxite mine in the country, saying it had failed to meet a stipulation that it build an aluminium refinery. Companies that complied with agreements had nothing to fear, he said.

Axis said it was seeking at least $29bn in damages in relation to its bauxite mine in the western Boké region, about 150km from the capital Conakry. The arbitration is being managed by the International Centre for the Settlement of Investment Disputes, an arm of the World Bank.

Axis International owns 85 per cent of Axis Minerals Resources — which held the local permit — while the Guinean state owns the remaining minority stake. The mine is operated by a local partner, Alliance Guinéenne de Bauxite d’Alumine et d’Aluminium.

Axis said it had filed the lawsuit on Christmas Day after the government had “ignored multiple attempts at settlement discussions”.

The company said it had lost its permit for the bauxite mine in May “without notice to or discussion with Axis Minerals or its shareholders”. Lawmakers had claimed to be targeting “non-operational or underutilised mines”, the company said.

However, Axis said its mine had been exporting mined material since 2020, and in 2024 had been the country’s second-largest producer of bauxite ore exports.

Before its licence was revoked this year, Axis had been on track to produce 48mn tonnes in 2025, it said. 

Axis International’s founder, Pankaj Oswal, said the company had contributed “materially to Guinea’s economy” since entering the country in 2013.

Vasundhara Oswal, director-general of Axis International, said the mine supported 5,000 direct and indirect workers and their families in Boffa, an area of Boké. “The sudden termination of the permit has had a direct and damaging impact on the people,” she said.