March 17, 2014

U.S., RUSSIA TO EXPAND NUCLEAR COOPERATION

By ExchangeMonitor

The United States and Russia signed an agreement yesterday to expand cooperation between the countries’ nuclear weapons laboratories on areas including nonproliferation, nuclear technology, science, energy, and environmental issues. The “Agreement between the Government of the United States of America and the Government of the Russian Federation on Cooperation in Nuclear- and Energy-Related Scientific Research and Development” was signed by Energy Secretary Ernest Moniz and Rosatom Director General Sergey Kirienko on the sidelines of the International Atomic Energy Agency’s General Conference yesterday in Vienna, Austria. The agreement will complement the U.S./Russia ‘123’ agreement on civil nuclear energy that entered into force in 2011, expanding the range of issues on which the countries can collaborate.

The Department of Energy said work on international safeguards, the creation of a “Multi-Purpose Fast Research Reactor International Research Center,” and the irradiation of fuels and materials in the fast-spectrum research reactor “BOR-60” would be covered by the agreement, as well as defending the earth from asteroids. The U.S. and Russia will assume their own costs incurred under the agreement, DOE said. “This Agreement supports President Obama’s nonproliferation and climate priorities by providing a venue for scientific collaboration and relationship-building between the U.S. and Russian research and technical communities,” Moniz said in a statement. “Jointly, these communities will work to further develop advanced technologies that can address some of our most pressing nuclear energy and nuclear security challenges.”

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