KIEV, March 19 - The owners of Zaporizhstal intend to sell their combined stake of 96.7% in one of Ukraine's biggest steel mills, alerting the likes of ArcelorMittal, a South Korean steel company and Ukraine's own biggest steel magnate, Rinat Akhmetov, a source told Interfax.

The source said Zaporizhstal's owners Eduard Shifrin, Alexander Shnaider, Ihor Dvoretsky, Artur Abdinov and Vitaliy Satsky, intended to sell because they were finding it hard to run the plant at a profit as iron ore prices grew and sales difficulties mounted.