Baku, Azerbaijan, May 18
By Anakhanum Idayatova - Trend:
Metsamor nuclear power plant is a threat not only to countries bordering with Armenia, but also the whole world, President of the Strategic Outlook Turkish International Research Center Yusuf Cinar told Trend May 18.
Armenia has a nuclear power plant, Metsamor, built in 1970. The power plant was closed after a devastating earthquake in Spitak in 1988. But despite the international protests, the power plant's operation was resumed in 1995. Moreover, a second reactor was launched there.
According to the ecologists and scholars all over the region, seismic activity of this area turns operation of the Metsamor nuclear power plant in an extremely dangerous enterprise, even if a new type of reactor is built.
Cinar said that the Metsamor nuclear power plant might, at any time, share the fate of the Japanese Fukushima Daiichi nuclear power plant. The expert said that the operating life of the Metsamor power plant has ended long time ago, according to research reports.
Cinar said that despite the numerous calls of the EU to shut down the plant, Armenia didn't react to them, and there are two reasons for that.
"First, Armenia covers its energy needs at the expense of Metsamor nuclear plant," Cinar said. "The second reason is political: the plant is located near Turkey and Azerbaijan, and continues to pose a danger to the security of these countries."
He said that Armenia never showed the slightest desire to close the plant, even during normalization of relations with Turkey.
"Given the situation in the Middle East and the threat of conflicts in the Caucasus, the slightest terrorist attack at the Metsamor nuclear power plant may lead to a catastrophe in the region," the expert said.
He went on to add that the international community should pay due attention to this real threat.
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