Washington may support Lithuania’s strive to stop the construction of the Belarusian nuclear power plant in Astravets, Lithuanian Energy Minister Žygimantas Vaičiūnas believes.
“The problem of Astravets was raised on my initiative. Similar to the Nord Stream 2 case, we have a common concept that no situation should be perceived as apoint of no return – at any stage of the project, we should do everything to prevent the project from being implemented, or to postpone the time of its implementation. I do count on US substantial contribution to averting the nuclear threat on the NATO flank, namely in Lithuania,” Vaičiūnas, who has recently visited the United States, says.
The Minister hopes the US will build its relations with Belarus taking into account the NPP issue.
On September 22, the head of Belarus claimed that Russia had violated the terms for construction. A day earlier, Alyaksandr Lukashenka asked Vladimir Putin to extend the repayment period of the loan allocated for the construction of the Astravets NPP and lower the interest rate. Lukashenka admitted that he was afraid that Russia would not manage to complete work by the new deadline as well. However, the Russian side promises that the first power unit of the NPP will start operating by the end of 2019.
At first, the NPP first power-generating unit was scheduled for commissioning in 2018, 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, Russia.
Lithuania has repeatedly criticized the construction of the nuclear power plant 50 kilometers from Vilnius and encouraged the rest of the countries of the United Europe to not buy electricity from the would-be NPP. Our neighbour is not only concerned about the proximity of the station to Vilnius, but also with a number of emergencies during the NPP construction. Among the emergencies are a reactor vessel incident, when it fell during the transportation, the collapse of the concrete structure at the site between the reactors. Our channel was the first to report on the incident. Before the official request of the Lithuanian side, representatives of the Belarusian NPP denied this information.
