UPDATE 1-Crystallex says World Bank body orders Venezuela to pay it $1.4 bln

(Adds more details, background, context)
April 5 (Reuters) - A World Bank tribunal has ordered
Venezuela to pay damages of nearly $1.4 billion to Crystallex
International Corp, a Canadian mining company, as compensation
for expropriating the miner's Las Cristinas mining project,
Crystallex said on Tuesday.
The award, worth $1.386 billion, was released on Monday by
the World Bank's International Centre for Settlement of
Investment Disputes, the company said in a statement.
Venezuela's oil and mining ministry did not immediately
respond to a request for comment. The award was not yet
available on the body's website.
Crystallex filed its arbitration request on Feb. 16, 2011
after former president Hugo Chavez's government took over the
gold project in 2008 as part of a plan to put key industries
into state hands.
Las Cristinas was Crystallex's flagship project and at the
time was regarded as one of the world's biggest undeveloped gold
deposits with estimated gold reserves of 12.5 million ounces.
But development was delayed for years by legal disputes and
permitting hold-ups.
The award to Crystallex follows that made by the same
tribunal in 2014 to another small Canadian miner, Gold Reserve,
who was awarded around $750 million for the 2009 termination of
its Las Brisas concession in Venezuela.
Gold Reserve and Venezuela, which is strapped for funds at a
time of low oil prices, triple-digit inflation and heavy debt
payments due this year, had been in a dispute over the payment
until February this year when they reached a deal to jointly
exploit the Brisas and Las Cristinas projects.
Crystallex "looks forward to collecting on the award on
behalf of all of its stakeholders", Chief Executive Robert Fung
said in a statement. He was not immediately available for
further comment.
Crystallex's legal team was led by international law firm
Freshfields Bruckhaus Deringer, it said. The firm was not
immediately available for comment.
Last November Crystallex filed a complaint in a U.S. court,
seeking to recover $2.8 billion it says it is owed from
Venezuela's state-run oil company PDVSA and its U.S. subsidiary.