OREANDA-NEWS. December 16, 2008. The Government of Russia has approved the agreement for peaceful nuclear cooperation with Australia signed in Sidney on Sept 7 2007 and is going to submit to the State Duma a bill for its ratification. Such a decision was made by the Prime Minister of Russia Dec 10 2008.

The Russian-Australian agreement for cooperation in the field of peaceful use of nuclear energy is subject to ratification by the parliaments of the two countries (it was expected that the document would be ratified by the autumn 2008).

The agreement says that, as the world’s leading uranium producer, Australia will supply uranium to Russia for its processing and use at Russian nuclear power plants.

As soon as the agreement takes force, Russian and Australian business entities will be able to conclude direct contracts on all types of activities stipulated by the document. Companies from third countries are allowed to purchase from Russia services for high-tech processing of uranium with Australian code (conversion, enrichment, fabrication of fuel for nuclear reactors). 

The previous Russian-Australian agreement, signed in 1990, allowed processing of Australian uranium in Russia exclusively in the interests of third countries.

Australia has almost half of the world’s uranium reserves. Russia has the world’s third biggest prospected uranium reserves (over 1,000,000 tons).