Participation in the tender for construction of a new power unit of the Dukovany Nuclear Power Plant (NPP) is not denied completely for the Russian state-run nuclear corporation Rosatom and the new government to be formed after parliamentary elections in the Czech Republic on October 8 and 9 may reconsider the decision of the current Cabinet to block its participation, head of the Czech State Office for Nuclear Safety Dana Drabova said on the air with the Ceske Televise TV Channel.
“The time has come now to announce the tender,” Drabova said, TASS reports.
“If we wait until [outcomes of parliamentary] elections, it may occur so that the new government [formed according to its result] will move away from the unity achieved at the political level concerning the ones to be invited [to bid] and not to be invited. The road for Russians [to participate in the Dukovany NPP tender] is not blocked completely,” she said.
The Czech authorities will officially remove Rosatom from the list of bidders to build a new power unit at the Dukovany NPP, Deputy Prime Minister, Minister of Industry and Trade Karel Havlicek said on April 19.
On April 18, Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis spoke in favor of barring Rosatom from taking part in the tender for the construction of a new power unit at the Dukovany NPP following clarification on the circumstances surrounding the Vrbetice ammunition blast of 2014. The Czech authorities claim that the Russian intelligence services behind the explosion. The Russian side denies its involvement in events occurred seven years ago.
On March 29, the Czech government included the Russian state corporation Rosatom, the American-Canadian company Westinghouse, France’s EDF, and South Korea’s KHNP on the list of bidders, following a proposal by the Industry and Trade Ministry.
The Cabinet of Ministers also decided that the tender will be announced after the elections to the lower house of the Czech parliament scheduled for October 8-9, 2021. The contract is estimated at about 6 billion euro.
