The Armenian government is playing the field in search of the best deal to construct a new nuclear power plant to replace the aging Metsamor facility.
Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan announced during a question-and-answer session in parliament that negotiations are ongoing with several nations. He added that the government had already decided that Metsamor’s replacement will be a “small modular” reactor.
“Now the next question is: with whom will we build, with whom will we cooperate?” he said.
Pashinyan went on to list five countries that have been engaged in discussions — Russia, the United States, China, France and South Korea. He asserted that the government will award the contract purely on the basis of economic considerations.
“We absolutely do not put a political component into it. We must focus on which of the proposals will suit us best in terms of commercial and economic benefits, and based on this, make a choice,” he said.
When Pashinyan was in Moscow in late September, Russian officials, including Kremlin kingpin Vladimir Putin, lobbied the prime minister hard for Rosatom, the Russian nuclear entity, to get the job. Just a few days later, Armenian officials announced they are striving to finalize a “123 agreement” with the United States to enable nuclear cooperation and the transfer of sensitive technologies.
