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The location in Sweden is not particularly bad. The logistics to shipping is very well established through the all season harbor Narvik (in Norway) because of the iron ore mines.

The culprit is the Sami people that just happened to live there before the more powerful swedish government annexed it. Who is right? The people who were here first herding reindeer or the government? Not a trivial question to answer if you take a step back.

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If you're a cynic, announcing that you've "discovered" a large of amount of REE in your iron ore tailings - and having the chief executive of the EU declare it strategically important - seems like a very good way of making sure you can continue mining iron ore for the forseeable future.

> The logistics to shipping is very well established through the all season harbor Narvik (in Norway) because of the iron ore mines.

Unless a train derails. Once. Or twice. Or, out of a sudden, it become too warm in May. Then some minor mines start to close. (Just telling it as it is, lol. Who knows what happens next)

Yeah maintenance has been a major problem lately.

But this route has delivered iron ore reliably for probaly 100 years now. The iron ore from Sweden was (somewhat paradoxically) the main reason Hitler invaded Norway.

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