Czech PM urges expertise in European nuke stress tests

(PRAGUE) - Czech Prime Minister Petr Necas said Thursday that stress tests at European nuclear plants should be a purely technical and free of politics, as the European Union finds itself deadlocked over the issue.

"We want the preparatory work on the stress tests, their course and above all assessment to be an exclusively expert process, not a politicised one," he told reporters at the two-day European Nuclear Energy Forum in Prague.

"We are convinced the nuclear events at the (Japanese) Fukushima plant should be rationally assessed, and measures raising safety standards at nuclear plants in the EU should be adopted on the basis of that," he added.

Talks about stress tests at European nuclear plants following the Fukushima accident, caused by a March earthquake, are deadlocked after Germany, Austria and the European Commission asked for parallel tests on resistance towards natural disasters and terror attacks.

The other 25 EU member countries want to separate the two types of tests as regulators insist there is no way for them to assess terrorism threats.

Necas said protecting people against terrorism was "the utmost interest of every national government" adding that such tests were part of security analyses at any industrial plant.

EU energy commissioner Guenther Oettinger told the forum that despite the deadlock he expected the stress tests to begin on June 1, with results to be presented at an EU summit in December.

"It is my goal to come to a joint agreement (on the stress tests) in the coming days," he said, calling for transparent tests "because public acceptance is key for the future of nuclear energy."

But Necas said a transparent evaluation of terrorism risks "might end up being an instruction on how to carry out a terror attack."

"I am convinced we should stick to expert criteria and not look for artificial political criteria," said Necas, whose country relies on nuclear energy for a third of its power consumption.