August 2003
Russia to Cease Storage for Bulgaria's Nuclear Waste: Report
People's Daily, 10 August 2003
Original address: http://english.peopledaily.com.cn/200308/10/eng20030810_122048.shtml
[Posted 14/08/2003]
Russia will no longer store nuclear waste for Bulgaria Kozloduy nuclear power station, local daily "Words" reported on Saturday.
Russia will no longer store nuclear waste for Bulgaria Kozloduy nuclear power station, local daily "Words" reported on Saturday.
Russia would continue to help Bulgaria process nuclear waste, but the processed waste must be sent back to Bulgaria for storage, the newspaper quoted officials from the Russian Ministry of Atomic Energy as saying.
According to the newly-released decree, it is illegal to store nuclear waste for other countries in Russian territory, the Russian ministry said.
Russian environmentalists in the Urals city of Chelyabinsk have protested for several times against underground storage for nuclear waste in the city, reports said.
It was Russian unilateral decision and the officials of two countries were in negotiation about the matter, said a manager of the Bulgarian nuclear power station.
According to an agreement signed in 1998 by Bulgaria and Russia, the two sides agreed that Russia would provide equipment, new technology and nuclear fuel and underground storage for nuclear waste of the Kozloduy nuclear power station for 20 years.
Bulgaria is now the biggest electricity-exporting nation in the Balkan peninsula. Kozloduy plant, the only nuclear plant in Bulgaria, which supplies 45 percent of the country's electricity, earned more than 100 million US dollars from exporting electricity to its Balkan neighbors in 2000.
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