UPDATE - EU pledges help for Ukraine's nuclear sector
Date: 12-Sep-01
Country: UKRAINE
In a communique issued after a one-day summit between top European and Ukrainian officials, the EU said also it expected Ukraine to meet conditions for securing European Bank for Reconstruction and Development funds.
Both sides agreed the importance of bringing safety levels in Ukraine's nuclear industry to Western standards.
The former Soviet republic is building two new nuclear reactors to replace the Chernobyl complex, which was shut down last December but the government is short of funds.
"The EU expresses its commitment to support Ukraine in resolving issues of nuclear safety and the social problems arising from the closure of Chernobyl," the communique said.
Reactor number four exploded at Chernobyl in 1986 in the world's worst civil nuclear accident, spewing a toxic cloud across northern Ukraine, Russia and Belarus, contaminating thousands of people and huge tracts of land.
At the summit, held in the Crimean resort of Yalta, Ukrainian officials said they also discussed possible EU support to help develop the key Odessa-Brody oil pipeline project, which feeds into a line supplying Europe from Russia.
The summit, attended by foreign policy chief Javier Solana, Belgian Prime Minister Guy Verhofstadt, and Ukrainian President Leonid Kuchma, also addressed the EU's concerns about corruption and press freedom in Ukraine.
The summit took place in the palace that hosted the historic 1945 Yalta Conference where Soviet dictator Josef Stalin and U.S. and British leaders redrew the post-war map of Europe.
