Official talks with Russia to build NPPs in Iraq

Shafaq News/ Russia and Iraq will sign documents on cooperation in the sphere of peaceful nuclear energy as soon as they finalize the relevant negotiations.

In statements to Sputnik on Wednesday, the Director-General of the Russian State Atomic Energy Corporation, Alexey Likhachev, "as soon as the negotiations are over, we will approach this [documents signing]," Likhachev said.

Rosatom earlier told reporters that Russia and Iraq are discussing the possibility of cooperation on different aspects of the peaceful nuclear energy, and the legal and regulatory framework for this partnership is being drafted.

A sources in Rosatom told RT, "the whole agenda for possible cooperation is being discussed within the framework of the dialogue with Iraq's partners on nuclear issues, whether in the energy sector or in non-energy applications of nuclear technologies for peaceful purposes."

For its part, Iraqi officials announced that they "intend to build eight nuclear power plants (NPPs) worth about forty billion dollars in the coming years to address the country's power shortages and meet the growing demand each year, especially in summer."

Kamal Hussein Latif, head of the Iraqi Commission for the Control of Radioactive Sources, said that talks with the Russian company had gone well and that his country was having similar discussions with other countries.

Hussein added that eight nuclear reactors are not the final number because they can only produce 8,000 MW, which only covers the current consumption demand from 2030-2035.