Russia is ready to help Egypt become a regional leader in the nuclear industry

Russia is ready to help Egypt become a regional leader in the nuclear industry: the intergovernmental agreement on the terms of nuclear power plant construction in Egypt and the contracts between the companies of two countries are almost ready for signing, said The Prime Minister of Russian Federation Dmitry Medvedev.

"Technical specifications and the number of nuclear power units, as well as the key commercial terms, have been agreed upon. They will be included in a new intergovernmental agreement, which is almost ready for signing. (…). We hope that the document will be signed during the next bilateral meeting at the highest level", – said Dmitry Medvedev in an interview with Egyptian newspaper "Al-Ahram".

According to the Head of the government, "Russian and Egyptian companies are already busy preparing a package of contracts for the NPP construction". "This project will create thousands of jobs, and provide a large order for the Egyptian industry and the construction sector. They are expected to be signed this autumn", – said D. Medvedev.

He emphasized: "Nuclear power engineering is a strategic area of Russian-Egyptian cooperation. I’m not overstating it. Russia is willing to help Egypt become a regional leader in the nuclear industry".

D. Medvedev reminded that certain agreements were reached during the visit of Russian President Vladimir Putin in Cairo on 10th February this year, when an agreement on the development of the NPP construction in Egypt was signed.

As Russian Prime Minister said: "Russia can supply the latest power units to Egypt, which are equipped with safety systems developed following the Fukushima-1 accident". New nuclear projects in Iran, India, China and other countries are built under the same projects.

D. Medvedev also noted that the oversight authorities of our countries "are working on drafting a memorandum of cooperation in nuclear energy infrastructure. Moreover, our respective finance ministers are conducting intensive consultations on another intergovernmental agreement, which will make a Russian government loan available to Egypt".

 "We will also provide broad opportunities for academic and hands-on training of Egyptian specialists at Russian nuclear facilities. We will help your country to train personnel for a future nuclear programme. About 50 Egyptian students will start training at Russian universities in various professions this year already", – promised the Head of the government of the Russian Federation.

In February this year Russian State Atomic Energy Corporation ROSATOM and the Ministry of Electricity and Renewable Energy of Egypt signed an agreement on the NPP construction on the territory of this country.

Sergey Kirienko, the General Director of ROSATOM, earlier told journalists that there "was reached an agreement in principle" on the construction of four NPP units according to Russian technology with a capacity of 1200 MW each and a total value about $20 billion. The project involves the allocation of interstate Russian loan. "We need to prepare two intergovernmental agreements for signing in a very tight deadline: one is about the NPP construction and another concerns intergovernmental agreement between ministers of Finance about lending. Commercial contracts will be signed on the bases of these two intergovernmental agreements", – noted the head of ROSATOM.

In August 2010 the Egyptian authorities declared that they intend to build the NPP on the Mediterranean coast in the town of Ed-Dabaa and expected to start the operation of the first power unit in 2019. After the building-up of the first power unit it is planned to construct three more reactors, which is preliminary planned to launch in 2025.