By Jason Mitchell Mauritania is already one of the leading iron ore and gold producers in Africa and the country has vast mining potential owing to its relative stability in the Sahel region. The Islamic Republic enjoys significant mining potential with more than 900 mineral occurrences, including iron ore, copper, gold, silver, phosphates, quartz, diamond, chromium, manganese, lead, zinc, platinum group metals, rare earths, gypsum, black sands, salts and peats. It produced 14m metric tonnes (mt) of iron ore in 2013, positioning it as the second biggest iron ore producer on the continent after…