Great Britain to help Ukraine with funds for Chornobyl closure (04/16/00)

Great Britain to help Ukraine with funds for Chornobyl closure

by Roman Woronowycz
Kyiv Press Bureau

KYIV - British Foreign Secretary Robin Cook announced during a one-day visit to Kyiv on April 12 that Great Britain will grant Ukraine $16.8 million for the completion of a new steel and concrete sarcophagus over the crippled fourth reactor at Chornobyl and said that London is ready to give further financial support to help finish two uncompleted reactors that Ukraine claims it needs in order to replace the Chornobyl facility.

"We are willing to fund the reactors to replace Chornobyl," Mr. Cook told reporters after a meeting with Ukraine's Foreign Affairs Minister Borys Tarasyuk.

Ukraine has promised to decommission Chornobyl, where the world's largest nuclear disaster occurred on April 26, 1986, by the end of the year, but has conditioned the closing on sufficient funding for both mothballing the nuclear complex and establishing adequate alternate energy sources.

The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development has stalled on an earlier promise to provide a $1.2 billion loan that Ukraine requested to finish two new reactors - one near Khmelnytskyi and another near Rivne. The EBRD has said that, until Ukraine's energy sector is privatized and made more efficient the two new reactors will not be economical.

Mr. Cook's announcement, made during a meeting with President Leonid Kuchma, was the highlight of the brief visit, which the foreign secretary said was intended to strengthen friendly relations and formalize them at the ministerial level.

Ties between the foreign affairs ministries of Ukraine and Britain strengthened markedly last year with the onset of the Kosovo conflict, when Ukraine attempted to act as a mediator between the Serbs and NATO. At the time, Minister Tarasyuk held several meetings with his British counterpart via telephone and in London, while Mr. Cook traveled to Kyiv, once as part of a European Union ministerial delegation.

During Mr. Cook's latest visit, the two ministries signed a memorandum of understanding on cooperation and consultation, that Mr. Cook said would "clearly set out contacts at the highest levels" and help to "maintain and increase our good relations with the people of Ukraine."

Ukraine's economic development was at the top of the agenda in meetings which Mr. Cook held with Ukrainian government officials, including President Kuchma, Prime Minister Viktor Yuschenko, Foreign Affairs Minister Tarasyuk and Verhkovna Rada Chairman Ivan Pliushch.

In 1999 Great Britain became the second largest foreign investor in Ukraine after the Netherlands, with $243 million in new investments, which Mr. Cook said would continue to grow if the Ukrainian government follows through on the vast economic and administrative reforms it has initiated.

The foreign secretary also voiced Britain's support for Ukraine to become a member of the World Trade Organization. Ukraine has set a goal for membership by the end of 2000.

In addition, Mr. Cook called on Ukraine and Great Britain to develop close lines of communication in the United Nations Security Council and to cooperate on reforming it. "It would be good if we could work together on reforms to fix the under-representation of this region of the world in the Security Council," said Mr. Cook.

Before his departure, the foreign secretary took part in the grand opening of a new building for the British Council, which is a cultural mission of the British government, and similar celebrations at the new offices of the Kyiv bureau of the BBC.

| Home Page |