Brussels, 27/05/2011 (Agence Europe) - Meeting in Deauville on 26-27 May, the leaders of the G8 (Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Russia, United Kingdom and United States) which counts among its ranks the world's main nuclear powers, pledged on Thursday to toughen safety in their nuclear power stations after the serious accident at the Fukushima Daiichi power station in Japan. Japan has announced that it wants to work with the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to organise an international nuclear safety summit in Japan in 2012.
As expected, the G8 leaders encourage those countries which have nuclear power plants to carry out audits, as the United States has done and Europe is preparing to do by means of the stress tests, criteria for which were agreed earlier this week (see EUROPE 10386). “The events in Japan confirm that there is a continuing need to re-evaluate safety and we recognise the importance of learning from the Fukushima accident and its aftermath. We welcome the initiative taken by many countries to carry out comprehensive risk and safety assessments of their existing nuclear installations, and invite all other countries operating nuclear power plants to launch similar assessments as soon as possible. Such assessments should include accident prevention, emergency preparedness, crisis management and mitigation, and post-accident management. All together, these measures will contribute to strengthening the safety infrastructure worldwide”, the final statement underlines. G8 leaders “urge countries to complete periodic review of safety assessments and to carry out assessments at every stage of a nuclear installation's lifetime, building on experience, and we reaffirm the high priority that we place on safety in the siting and design of new reactors, and the necessity of continuous improvement, learning from incidents and accidents everywhere”.
To toughen international safety standards, G8 leaders have also called for a review of the Convention on Nuclear Safety, a process which will begin with a meeting of the contracting parties in August 2012, to review measures that could strengthen the Convention, “notably regarding safety objectives, the responsibility of governments for timely and sufficient measures on accident prevention and management, including the adjustment of procedures for coordination and interaction between the government, the operator and the safety authority, as well as an effective peer review mechanism”.
Highlighting the importance of international cooperation, the G8 stressed the key role played by the IAEA, which will host a ministerial meeting in Vienna on 20-24 June at which discussions will follow up on the meeting of national nuclear safety authorities of the G20 countries, due to take place in Paris on 7-8 June. (E.H./transl.rt/jl)