“The facts clearly demonstrate that yesterday’s announcement by the Financial Times and its sources are false and completely misleading”, Zoltán Kovács, spokesperson of the Hungarian government told media. According to Financial Times (FT), the European Union has blocked Hungary’s €12bn nuclear deal with Russia, because Euratom has refused to approve Hungary’s plans to import nuclear fuel exclusively from Russia.
In response to the report Zoltán Kovács said that both EURATOM and its supply agency had reviewed one of the implementation agreements, namely the fuel supply agreement, and indeed had requested certain modifications. Ongoing talks about addressing these observations, however, do not block the project and have no effect on the validity and enforceability of the Engineering, Procurement and Construction Agreement (EPC) that came into force on January 1, 2015, Kovács said. “Our expectation is that, following intensive negotiations, the fuel supply contract will be finalized in line with EURATOM requirements in a matter of weeks”, he added.
In accordance with the energy strategy of the Hungarian government and its efforts to strengthen the country’s energy security, decrease carbon-emissions and establish affordable resources of energy, in early 2014 the Cabinet concluded inter-governmental agreements to maintain the domestic nuclear electricity generating capacities of the Paks nuclear plant, Zoltán Kovács said. Maintaining the Paks capacities will also help to decrease Hungary’s dependence on external gas supplies, he insisted.
These inter-governmental agreements were presented to the relevant EU authorities who, after due and careful survey of the material provided, put forward no objections, the spokesman said. Following this, the authorised Hungarian organisation, entered into three implementation agreements with the authorised Russian organisation, a Rosatom subsidiary, on December 9, 2014. “All required notifications were made to the European Commission prior to the signing of these agreements.”, Kovács added. The spokesman also said that the government cannot provide the media with any further information at this point, since any further details on the documentation and ongoing talks constitute classified material.
via kormany.hu and MTI photo: Tibor Illyés – MTI