The Russian Federation and the Republic of Uzbekistan signed the intergovernmental agreement

The signing ceremony of the Intergovernmental Agreement between the Russian Federation and the Republic of Uzbekistan concerning the importation to the Russian Federation of irradiated nuclear fuel of the research reactor IIN-3M of Tashkent-based JSC Foton took place April 9 in ROASATOM’s central administration building, BelTA learnt at the Communications Department of ROSATOM.

The agreement was signed by ROSATOM CEO Sergei Kiriyenko and Head of the State Inspectorate for Subsoil, Safe Work in Industry, Mining under the Cabinet of Ministers of Uzbekistan Bakhtiyor Gulyamov.

The agreement provides for repatriation of Russia-flagged highly enriched nuclear fuel of Uzbekistan’s pulse research reactor IIN-3M for subsequent reprocessing. As the result of implementation of this Agreement there will be no more highly enriched nuclear fuel in Uzbekistan. By this, Russia will substantially contribute to the strengthening of the nuclear nonproliferation regime.

The flight from Uzbekistan is planned to make before the end of the year.

Earlier, in 2012, irradiated highly enriched fuel assemblies used in the research reactor VVR-SM of the Nuclear Physics Institute of the Uzbekistan Academy of Sciences were repatriated to Russia. Their weight with regard to uranium was 73 kg. Reactor VVR-SM has already been converted to low enriched fuel, which is supplied by the Fuel Company of ROSATOM TVEL. The reactor decommissioning plan was written with involvement of the IAEA, and in future Russia will be ready to give Uzbekistan an opportunity of using Russian research reactors of the similar types for production purposes.

ROSATOM considers the repatriation of highly enriched uranium fuel of Russia-designed research reactors a highly important element of the system of maintaining and strengthening the nuclear nonproliferation regime. This joint Russia-U.S. program is implemented with the active participation of the U.S. Department of Energy and the IAEA and covers 14 states, including Uzbekistan. Over the period of the program, 2,059 kg of irradiated and fresh HEU have been returned to Russia. This amount would be sufficient to make about 82 nuclear warheads. This year, in addition to Uzbekistan, highly enriched SNF is planned to remove from Poland and Kazakhstan. The Russian research reactor fuel repatriation program embraces Belarus, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Germany, Hungary, Kazakhstan, Latvia, Libya, Poland, Romania, Serbia, Ukraine, Uzbekistan, and Vietnam.