ArcelorMittal wants 'amicable' deal on Italy steelworks

ROME - ArcelorMittal has offered to sell its stake or become a minority shareholder in an Italian steelworks after Rome moved to put the plant under state supervision, the chief executive said in a letter seen by AFP Saturday.

Aditya Mittal wrote to Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni to press for an "amicable solution" to the crisis over the struggling ex-Ilva plant, one of Europe's largest steelworks.

The letter was dated Thursday, the day Meloni's hard right government announced it had taken the first step towards putting the plant under state supervision.

Talks with ArcelorMittal, which owns a 62-percent stake, had broken down over how to keep production going and secure thousands of jobs at the plant in the southern city of Taranto.

In the letter, initially reported by the ANSA news agency but then obtained by AFP, Mittal said he was keen to avoid "extreme unilateral actions".

He says the government appears to want to end its joint venture with ArcelorMittal, the world's largest steelmaker, in which state investment body Invitalia has a 38-percent stake.

To make a "clean break", ArcelorMittal has "offered to sell our entire stake to Invitalia for a fraction of our cash investment", the chief executive wrote, in English and Italian.

"Although Invitalia has refused, this offer remains on the table should the government wish to consider it."

Alternatively, "we are prepared to remain as a minority strategic partner... as the Italian government decides on a permanent solution", Mittal wrote.