We are pleased with the very positive reception our offer has received, and are confident that progress is being made towards establishing the regulatory framework for the offer.

I understand that this has taken a lot of politicians by surprise. But we believe that this is an important and right step for the steel industry.

We are not in the business of iron ore. Whatever captive iron ore sources we have, we use it to make steel.

The danger, though - and there have been signs of this recently - is that Europe begins to demonstrate a return to more nationalist sentiment. To my mind, that would be a great mistake.

I am very confident that we will be able to convince all the stakeholders - the shareholders, the governments and the employees, that this is in their best interests.

Production cutbacks have remained in place in the third quarter and this has helped to further reduce inventory levels worldwide.

It is true that we are interested in scale but there are very sound reasons for this.