French nuclear group Areva will maintain its operations in Niger despite last week's deadly car bomb attack at its uranium mine in the African country, Areva president Luc Oursel said Tuesday.

"I have one thing to say after this scandalous attack: we will stay in Niger," he said during a meeting with journalists in Madrid.

Asked if the attack carried out last week would lead to a change in Areva's strategy in Africa he said: "No, of course not. We are obviously very sad about the death of one of our employees. We condemn this."

"I was in Niger, I went last week to show our determination to stay. If we leave Niger, we will do exactly what they wanted. We know our responsibility in terms of economic development, in terms of jobs," he added.

Areva, the world's second-largest uranium producer, extracts more than a third of its uranium in the impoverished west African country.

It has operated in Niger for more than 40 years and operates two huge mines in the north of the country through two affiliated companies, Somair and Cominak.

A car bomb attack attack carried out at Areva's majority-owned uranium mine in Arlit in northern Niger on Thursday killed one person and injured 14 others, all of them Nigerian nationals who worked at the facility.

Another bombing carried out that same day at an army base in Agadez in northern Niger killed 24 people in addition to eight attackers who were killed.

Two Islamist groups claimed the attacks, calling them retaliation for the country sending troops to help a French-led campaign against Al-Qaeda-linked insurgents in Mali.

ka/ds/yad

EPR