CORRECTED - French nuclear engineering company Assystem has made an offer of €125 million ($136 million) to Areva and EDF to take a 5% stake in Areva's nuclear reactor business, referred to as 'New Areva NP'. French utility EDF agreed in July 2015 to take a stake of between 51% and 75% in Areva's reactor unit in a government-backed plan to revitalise France's nuclear power industry. Strategic investors will be able to take minority stakes in the business.

KazAtomProm's newly created trading subsidiary TH Kazakatom will bring much needed liquidity to the uranium spot market, its chief commercial director Riaz Rizvi has told the World Nuclear Fuel Cycle conference in Toronto, Canada. Rizvi said that, as part of KazAtomProm's ongoing Transformation Program, it had established a trading office in Switzerland to buy and sell uranium on the spot market.

Russian nuclear fuel manufacturer JSC TVEL has signed contracts for the supply of fuel and engineering services for units 1 and 2 of the Tianwan nuclear power plant. The units are Russian-supplied VVER-1000 reactors, of which two more are under construction at the site in China's Jiangsu province.

A plate-type uranium-molybdenum fuel for research reactors has completed performance tests in the USA. The fuel could be used to replace highly-enriched uranium fuel, which can pose a proliferation risk.

Australia wishes to export uranium to India "as soon as possible", Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull said today. Turnbull made his comments during an official visit to India.

CORRECTED: The loading of spherical moderator elements has begun at China's Shidaowan HTR-PM - a high-temperature gas-cooled reactor (HTGR) demonstration project. The unit is scheduled to begin operating later this year.

Japan's Nuclear Regulation Authority has approved the restart of Global Nuclear Fuel-Japan's fuel fabrication plant in Yokosuka in Kanagawa Prefecture. Last month the regulator concluded the facility meets revised safety standards.

Tokyo Electric Power Company has completed a five-day investigation of the primary containment vessel (PCV) of the damaged unit 1 of the Fukushima Daiichi plant using a robot. The results of the survey will help Tepco determine the location of fuel debris within the vessel.

Areva NP has recently been awarded three patents for innovations in the fuel operation as well as anticorrosion and maintenance tooling fields. The patents were for innovations developed by Areva employees in the USA.

The first cask containing used nuclear fuel from the Sizewell B pressurised water reactor has been placed within the unit's new dry fuel store. The milestone marks the first use of dry used fuel storage technology in the UK.

The Euratom Supply Agency, the nuclear watchdog of the European Union, has approved Berkeley Energia's offtake agreement for the sale of the first production from its Salamanca uranium mine under development in Spain. The mine is expected to enter production in late 2018.

The Swiss Federal Nuclear Safety Inspectorate has called for the systematic management of the aging of containers in the country's interim radioactive waste storage facilities. The requirement follows the completion of a study into container aging and fuel handling in such facilities.