Brussels, 25/10/2006 (Agence Europe) - On Tuesday, the Commission adopted a recommendation to the Council with a view to the conclusion of a cooperation agreement between the European Atomic Energy Community (Euratom) and Kazakhstan on the peaceful use of nuclear energy. This agreement will add to existing cooperation initiatives on nuclear safety and nuclear fusion, by bringing in a stable framework to facilitate the development of nuclear commerce between the two parties. This cooperation may take the form of the exchange of technical and expert information, joint seminars and projects and programmes drafted jointly. The commercial value of the agreement has been estimated at 500 million EUR for an initial duration set at 10 years. Kazakhstan, which holds a fifth of the world's known uranium resources, is the third largest producer of uranium in the world after Australia and Canada. Even so, the country currently supplies the Union's power stations with just 3% of the uranium they use. (eh)