Azerbaijan, Baku, 10 September/ Trend , corr E. Tariverdiyeva, V. Zhavoronkova/ Analysts believe US Administration decision to recall Russian-American Civil Nuclear Cooperation Agreement known as Agreement 123 to be short-sighted.
"I think I think that it was a very short-sighted decision by the United States to do that. Cutting down on nuclear materials benefits everyone, it's not something intended to line Russia's pockets," Victoria Samson, US expert on national security said.
In the evening of 8 September, George Bush recalled from Congress the US-Russia agreement on cooperation in civil nuclear energy and stated that the agreement did not correspond to interests of the US national security.
Ratification of the document by both parties would enable Russia to cooperate with US companies first of all in the sphere of development of production technology of MOX-fuel (mixed-oxide fuel), mixed fuel on the basis of oxide of plutonium-239 and uranium-238, sale of domestic uranium to US consumers without mediators and anti-damping dues, production of reactors on fast neutrons.
Americans had their own interests in Agreement 123. This interest includes hangar project to establish the International Uranium Enrichment Centre in the Baykal region, said Eugene Lawson, the president of the US-Russia Business Council, who represents interests of the US hugest company, Rosbalt reported: "After ten years of rivalry in nuclear field, at present our countries can closely cooperate to develop new technologies and to assist other countries in providing peaceful atomic energy."
According to Louson, this agreement not only "secures access of US companies to the Russian market for trade of nuclear products of civil nature" but also "open opportunities to create "storage of waste nuclear fuel and centre for uranium enrichment" in Russia.
US experts call into question efficiency of recall of this agreement. Senior research fellow of Washington-based Centre for Strategic and International Studies in Robert Ayhorn is sure that benefits from Agreement 123 are almost equal and Russia is not interested in that more than US.
Russians would like to have this agreement, but they are not fond of it. They are ready to live without it," PRIME TASS quoted Ayhorn, former US Secretary of State assistant, as saying.
According to US expert on security Andy Grotto, both parties lose from the recall of the agreement. "Both sides lose, and not only because the pact would facilitate U.S.-Russian cooperation on a security threat that both regard as a top priority, namely nuclear proliferation and the possible spread of sensitive nuclear fuel-making facilities," said Grotto, analysts on national security of Center of Development of US.
On the contrary, Pavel Felgenhauer, a Russian military expert believes that basically, Russia will lose, because this is an important contract enabling its integration to the world markets of nuclear energy services. Agreement 123 removed every obstacle, including dumping ones, because currently the US market is limited and it is not accessible for us," Felgenhauer told Trend over telephone.
One more such disputable result of actions of the United States can be in further worsening of relations with Russia.
"By taking this move, US hurts relationship with Russia in two ways: 1) we soured it even further, if that's possible; and 2) we lost out on the opportunity to shore up our national security by monitoring and eventually cutting down the amount of nuclear material out there," Samson, analyst on security said to Trend by email.
First, the agreement was announced at the Great Eights summit in Strelne in 2006, where Vladimir Putin and Bush agreed to work out the document. This nuclear work took about tow years and finally, framework intergovernmental agreement was inked in spring of 2008.
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