Turkey’s Energy Ministry has refused to deliver an international infrastructure report on the country’s much-debated Akkuyu nuclear power plant on which construction has started in the country’s southern province of Mersin to a court, saying the report concerns the security or interests of the state, a Turkish daily reported.
According to a Hürriyet daily main story published on Thursday, the Turkish government asked the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to prepare a report on Turkey’s planned first nuclear power plant. Turkey Atomic Energy Agency head Zafer Alper and Energy Ministry Undersecretary Metin Kilci received the “Integrated Nuclear Infrastructure Review” report prepared by the IAEA in February 2014; however, the Turkish government did not make the report public as is common practice in other states such as Poland, the United Arab Emirates and Belarus. The report, which only Turkey is authorized to publicize as part of the agreement between Turkey and the IAEA, reportedly contains 24 pieces of advice and 15 suggestions for the Turkish government on the controversial nuclear project.
The report on Akkuyu, which has been called a “nuclear secret,” came to the public’s attention when the Mersin 1st Administrative Court asked for the report from the Energy Ministry as part of a case involving an environmental impact report (ÇED) for the Akkuyu nuclear power plant that was approved by the Ministry of the Environment. The lawyers for 86 natural and legal persons, including Mersin’s Chamber of Medical Doctors, the Ecology Collective and the Mersin Bar Association, who appealed a file against the ÇED report and asked the court to impose a stay on the implementation of the plant, also asked that the IAEA report to be reviewed by the court. In its interim report issued on March 23, the Mersin court asked the infrastructure report from the Energy Ministry in addition to other documents from various institutions.
However, in an answer prepared by the Energy Ministry’s Nuclear Project Implementation Department deputy head Sibel Gezer on April 27 and delivered to court on May 4, the ministry refused to send the report, citing an article of the law concerning an administrative procedure code.
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