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The Akdala deposit in southern Kazakhstan was developed under a 2001 Subsoil Use Agreement held by YUGHK LLP (South Mining and Chemical Company), a JV owned 70% by Uranium One (a wholly-owned subsidiary of Russia's Rosatom State Nuclear Energy Corporation) and 30% by Kazatomprom. Upon expiry of the 25-year contract, Kazakhstan's Department of Atomic Energy issued a notice terminating the old rights, then signed a new SUA with the same YUGHK structure effective 29 March 2026 — one day after the old contract expired.
The new agreement is explicitly transitional: Kazatomprom's disclosure confirms that following the eventual expiration of this SUA (production through ~2030, with ~1,500 tU reserves remaining), the deposit will transfer to Kazatomprom under a trust management arrangement. This follows the same institutional playbook Kazakhstan used in other Soviet-era JVs: allow a final-term production agreement to run to depletion, then recapture the asset as the national company.
Akdala is one of the last active Kazakhstani uranium deposits where Rosatom retains a majority stake. Most of Kazakhstan's capacity expansion has been structured to exclude or dilute Russian participation (e.g., the Budenovskoye JV with Uranium Energy Corp, the US-KZ Critical Minerals MOU of November 2025, and the EU-KZ Strategic Partnership Roadmap). The renewal of YUGHK's SUA preserves Rosatom's 70% control through 2030, but the trust management trigger on expiry signals that this is a managed exit rather than a long-term entrenchment.
From a supply-chain perspective, Akdala's ~1,500 tU remaining reserves and small-scale production are not systemically significant (Kazatomprom produces ~29,000 tU/year at 100% basis). The action is notable mainly for its geopolitical optics: Kazakhstan continues to transact with Rosatom subsidiaries on existing deposits even as it courts Western partners for greenfield and expansion capacity.
slice of the Russia-aligned uranium supply chain for the medium term.
the state-capture trajectory codified in the December 2025 subsoil code amendments (2025-12-26 action).
error in Kazakhstan's ~30,000 tU/year total.
(Cameco, Orano, or under a US-KZ bilateral framework) rather than rolling it back to Rosatom under a new instrument.
Akdala's remaining infrastructure into its wholly-owned portfolio?