Serbia To Merge RTB Bor Operations

The Serbian government has announced that it will not seek to privatise the country's state-owned copper company, RTB Bor. Instead the smelter and the mining department will merge into a single entity with the Serbian state turning debt into assets, and the state will become the majority owner.

The government said it was ready to invest 130 million euros in a new copper smelter to help it boost production and minimise environmental damage.

RTB Bor is situated in the eastern town of Bor and it is estimated to have debts of around $500 million in debts, largely as a result of mismanagement under the rule of former President Slobosan Milosevic and international isolation during the Balkan War of the early-nineties.

Until recently the government had been trying to sell its 67 percent stake in the company, however a fall in world copper prices led to a failure to attract investors. Two previous attempts to sell the company also failed after Romanian buyers, first Cuprom, then A-Tec pulled out of the sale.