Warsaw has no intention to purchase energy from the Belarusian nuclear power plant which is currently under construction in Astravets, Poland’s Foreign Minister Witold Waszczykowski said.
According to the top diplomat, the Polish authorities will not change its tune even if the IAEA evaluation is positive.
“We will not change our opinion on buying energy from this NPP. I think that it is based on dangerous technologies; once the state of insecurity led to the Chernobyl disaster. Therefore, we are against this plant, we are not going to cooperate and buy its energy,” he said.
“We have a different point of view,” Waszczykowski added in response to a comment that the IAEA considers the project safe.
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The NPP first power-generating unit is scheduled for commissioning in 2019, the second one – in 2020. The construction of two nuclear reactors is provided in the agreement reached by Belarus and Russia, the reactors being supplied by Atomstroyexport, a subsidiary of the Russian state corporation Rosatom and the general contractor at the Belarusian NPP construction. The project faced opposition at home and abroad on both safety and political grounds.
ithuania is the main critic of the idea of the Belarusian nuclear power plant, which is only 20 km from the border and 50 km from Vilnius. Minsk rejects Lithuania’s claims, arguing that nuclear power plants will have high safety standards. Vilnius asked Brussels for involvement of the European Union in the matter.
On 8 April 2016, there was a collapse of the structural frame of the would-be nuclear service building at Astravets NPP, of which Belsat.eu was informed in early May.
At first, the authorities denied our report saying that there had not been any incidents at the construction site. State-run mass media remained silent as well. After the publication Lithuania summoned Belarus’ ambassador and handed him a diplomatic note demanding explanation over the incident.
As reported earlier, during the installation the enclosure of the future reactor fell from the height of 2 – 4 meters at the construction site of the Belarusian NPP in Astravets.
