Launch of Iran’s Bushehr plant delayed, dragging 10 years behind schedule
Published 16 November, 2009, 20:18
Moscow says the nuclear power plant it is building for Iran will not go online this year. The project is now 10 years behind schedule. The facility near the city of Bushehr is part of Iran's nuclear program.
“We will reach significant results regarding this issue by the end of 2009, but the plant itself won’t be launched,” Russia’s Energy Minister Sergey Shmatko said.
The technical regulations imply several key stages of finishing the construction and launching the facility.
“It won’t start in 2009, but it wasn’t planned on schedule,” the Ministry explained, adding that the process on the ground is going well and that the Iranians are generally satisfied with how the project has developed.
In 1975, a branch of German company Siemens started the construction of the Bushehr atomic power plant. The deal was torn up in 1979 because of the Islamic Revolution, and the construction was subsequently halted. In 1992, Russia got involved in the project and, according to amendments made in 2005, Iran was obliged to transfer nuclear waste to Russia for long-term storage or further re-processing.
It was initially planned to finish the construction of the plant in July 1999, but the date was delayed numerous times.
Also, on Monday a report is expected from the IAEA, the watchdog on Iran’s nuclear programme. In October a group of IAEA monitors visited the recently revealed second uranium enrichment facility in Iran. The new report is expected to shed some light on the situation with nuclear research in the country.
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