MOSCOW REGION, June 9 (RIA Novosti) - Russia's president has called on the nuclear industry to assume a greater role in meeting the nation's energy needs and for security to be tightened at nuclear facilities and around the country's nuclear arsenal.
Addressing a gathering of top nuclear-industry officials Friday, Vladimir Putin said action had to be taken to ensure nuclear plants continued to play any significant role in providing energy for the country.
"The percentage of nuclear fuel in the country's energy balance is 16%," the president said. "And if we do nothing in this area, but just keep on moving at today's pace, it will drop to 1-2% by 2030."
With much of the industrialized world considering the future of nuclear energy - Britain's Tony Blair for one approved a new generation of plants in May - Putin tasked his government earlier in the year to draft a program to bring the share of nuclear power in overall electricity production up to 25%.
And today, Sergei Kiriyenko, a former prime minister and now head of the Federal Agency for Nuclear Power, told the meeting at the president's country residence that two more power units would be built from 2007 and another four or five would follow in both 2009 and 2010.
In May, Kiriyenko called for 40 new reactor units - the country currently has 35 units at 10 nuclear power plants - to be built during a trip to the United States.
"We need to build about 40 units just to keep the share of nuclear power [in the energy market]," he said then.
Kiriyenko's U.S. trip largely focused on trying to secure an end to restrictions on imports from Russia of low-enriched uranium that have been in force since the Soviet era. Russia is allowed to operate on the U.S. market without a 116% import duty only through a special intermediary agent, under the HEU-LEU Conversion program, but is facing anti-dumping procedures.
And in a thinly disguised hint to Washington, Putin criticized Friday discrimination against Russian nuclear technologies on the global market saying Russia was prepared for an honest competition with other countries.
"We categorically oppose the lack of an equal competition for all market players, which hampers our companies' activities," he said.
The president also highlighted the role of nuclear power in the global social and economic situation.
"Civilian nuclear technologies can seriously reduce the energy-poverty levels of developing states, and create conditions for socio-economic progress and increased quality of life for millions of people," he said.
Given the international community's concerns over Iran's controversial nuclear programs, Putin reiterated Russia's position that all countries had the right to nuclear technologies for non-military purposes.
But with the world having marked the 20th anniversary in April of the world's worst nuclear disaster at the Soviet Union's Chernobyl plant, the president called on security to be tightened at all the country's nuclear facilities, in particular to combat the threat of terrorism.
"We must increase the safety level of the nuclear complex, not only to prevent accidents and emergencies but also to prevent terrorist provocations," Putin said.
He said also improvements should be made to the country's nuclear arsenal, regarded by many within the country as guaranteeing it a major international role, in compliance with strict safety requirements.
"The strength of the nuclear shield, the state of the nuclear complex are the most important components of Russia's status as a world power," Putin said.
Russia inherited the Soviet Union's massive nuclear arsenal after the communist superpower collapsed in 1991.
