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2012 03 26

Lithuanian president: Nuclear power plant projects in Belarus and Kaliningrad lack transparency

The nuclear projects planned in Belarus and Russia's Kaliningrad region lack transparency, Lithuania's President Dalia Grybauskait4 said in an interview to South Korea's media published on Monday.
Dalia Grybauskaitė
Dalia Grybauskaitė / AFP/„Scanpix“ nuotr.

Russian and Belorussian officials have rejected the criticism.

"Unfortunately, not all nuclear power plant projects in the region are assessed in accordance to the same criteria, methodology and attitude towards transparency," Grybauskaitė told Korea Herald.

"The new nuclear projects in Kaliningrad and Belarus, the latter just 50 kilometers from Lithuania's capital city Vilnius, are planned without proper safety assessments, providing no transparency and without sharing information," the Lithuanian president said.

"Since nuclear accidents do not respect national borders, we urge other countries to participate in building confidence by performing stress tests, appropriate environmental impact assessments and, what is the most important, sharing all the information and providing answers to all questions," she told the press.

Lithuania has repeatedly expressed concerns over shortcomings in safety standards by nuclear facilities planned close to Lithuania's border in Russia and Belarus. Together with two other Baltic states, Lithuania intends to build a new nuclear power plant of its own in Visaginas.

Russia's Embassy in Seoul told the Korea Herald that the country had carried out relevant safety checks and environmental impact assessments on the new Baltic Nuclear Power Plant being built in Kaliningrad, and had shared information with neighboring countries.

"Unfortunately, there is only one country ― Lithuania ― that refuses to accept Russia’s offer to hold official bilateral consultations on the environmental impact assessment of the Baltic NPP. Russia participates and carefully implements provisions of all international conventions on nuclear safety, radiological protection and nuclear security,” the embassy said.

Belorussian Ambassador to Korea Natalia Zhylevich said that her country was party to all relevant international treaties, with the works being checked by the International Atomic Energy Agency.

"Belarus is a country that has gone through Chernobyl. The Belorussian people know very well what a nuclear accident means. This is exactly the reason why security and safety of the nuclear power plant that is under construction in Belarus are matters of utmost importance to the Belorussian government,” the ambassador said.

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