* ENRC agrees to buy CAMEC for 20 pence per share
* Has 55 percent of shares, CAMEC to recommend deal
* To fund deal with available cash resources
* CAMEC shares up 6.9 percent, ENRC up 1.8 percent (Adds conference call, analyst comment)
By Julie Crust and Eric Onstad
LONDON, Sept 18 (Reuters) - Kazakh mining group ENRC on Friday wrapped up a $955 million cash deal to buy junior firm CAMEC, which will diversify the firm into metals such as copper and into high-risk areas of Africa.
ENRC already holds 55.2 percent of CAMEC shares through market purchases and agreements with shareholders and CAMEC plans to recommend the deal, ENRC said in a statement.
Shares in AIM-listed Central African Mining and Exploration Co. (CAMEC) jumped 6.9 percent to 19.50 pence by 1240 GMT, slightly under ENRC's 20-pence a share offer, which values the group at 584 million pounds ($955 million).
The shares have more than doubled since CAMEC announced in July that it had been approached about possible takeovers and have soared more than eightfold since the start of the year.
Shares in ENRC, one of the world's biggest ferrochrome producers, gained 1.8 percent to 911.5 pence.
ENRC said it had purchased all of the CAMEC stake owned by major shareholder Dan Gertler, an Israeli resources investor. Gertler owned around 35 percent of CAMEC.
After ENRC announced on Wednesday that it was considering an offer, some analysts said the move might spark a bidding war with Chinese parties, but Ambrian analyst Brock Salier said it appeared that ENRC had sealed the takeover.
"The synergies with ENRC are clear, and, due to the political goodwill that ENRC will be chasing in both the DRC and Zimbabwe, the recommendation by CAMEC suggests to us that this deal will definitely go through," he said in a note.
ADDS COPPER TO PORTFOLIO
ENRC declined to say whether it would bid for another AIM-listed mining firm, African Minerals, which issued a statement on Thursday saying it had held talks with ENRC.
But Jim Cochrane, ENRC's head of marketing and business development, said the firm still had further ambitions for mergers and acquisitions.
"We still have a number of projects that we're looking for... certainly we won't say this is the end of looking at M&A opportunities." The takeover will immediately add copper to the portfolio of ENRC, whose main products currently are ferrochrome and iron ore. Copper prices have doubled so far this year in a rebound after last year's collapse, driven by demand in China. "What ENRC shareholders will gain is world class, low-cost copper-cobalt resources in the Democratic Republic of Congo (DRC) with a great potential," company Chief Executive Felix Vulis told a conference call. "ENRC will bring the financial capability to develop the assets that CAMEC lacks."
ENRC plans $230 million in capital expenditure to boost copper production in the DRC to 75,000 tonnes within three years, Vulis added.
The DRC has a wealth of metals and minerals but many other major mining firms have shied away from investing there due to political instability.
"We are not denying there are political risks in the Congo... (but) we believe in due course it's very much manageable," Vulis said.
CAMEC also has projects of coal in Mozambique, platinum in Zimbabwe and bauxite -- the raw material to make aluminium -- in Mali.
ENRC said the offer will be funded through its available cash resources. ($1=.6116 Pound) (Editing by Rosalba O'Brien and Karen Foster)