Belarusian President Invites Japan to Take Part in Nuclear Plant Project

Text of report by privately-owned Belarusian news agency Belapan

Minsk, 18 October: Belarus invites Japan to cooperate in the construction of a nuclear power plant, [Belarusian President] Alyaksandr Lukashenka said on 18 October in an interview with the Japanese news agency Kyodo Tsushin.

According to official sources, the president said that “Japan possesses state-of-the-art nuclear energy technologies. We would like to cooperate with Japan very much if it offers the best project in terms of its price, quality and other criteria. We are absolutely open for cooperation with all the countries in this sector”.

Lukashenka stressed that Belarus views Japan as “a state that can build the safest reactor in the world”. He recalled that three groups of foreign companies – a US-Japanese company, a French- German company and a Russian company – are currently viewed as potential participants in the nuclear power plant construction. According to Lukashenka, Belarus will consider all the proposed variants and will choose the best one.

According to the president, Belarus plans to use other countries’ experience, so that domestic specialists could learn to build such facilities during the plant construction.

Originally published by Belapan news agency, Minsk, in Russian 1116 18 Oct 07.

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